Samarasya Studies in Indian Arts, Philosophy, and Interreligious Dialogue — in Honour of Bettina Baumer — ee Qe xr OS whe mw, Loe a Bey edited by Sadananda Das Ernst Fiirlinger D.K.Printworld (P) Ltd. New Delhi(Cataloging in Publication Data — DK (Courtesy: D.K. Agencies (P) Lid. ] studies in Indian arts, philosophy and interreligious Simarasy dialogue : in honour of Bettina Baumer / edited by Sadananda Das, Emst Farlinger. p Ban Bettina Baumer, b. 1940, Austrian scholar of Indology and religious studies and former Director of Alice Boner Institute, Varanasi, India; contributed articles. Includes bibliographical references. Includes index. ISBN 8124603083 1. Ant Indic. 2 Philosophy, Indic, 3, Cultural relations — Religious aspects. 4, Cross-cultural studies — Religious studies. 5, Religions — Relations. 1 Blumer, Bettina, 1940- I. Das, Sadananda, 1969 I Falinger, Est, 1962- Doc 114 21 ISBN 81-246-0338-3 First published in India in 2005 © For Preface with Sadananda Das, Emst Firlinger. Copyright for individual articles, with the authors. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage of retrieval system, without prior written permission of both the copyright owner, indicated above, and the publisher ‘The views expressed in this volume are those of the authors, and are not necessarily those of the editors or the publisher. Published and Printed by: ux Princwora( . Regd. Office: ‘Sei Kunj’, F-52, Bali Nagar New Delhi-110 015 ‘Phones: (O11) 2545-3975; 2546-6019; Fax: (O11) 2546-5926 Exmail: dkprintworld@vanl.net Website: www. dkprintworld.comA Commentary on the Opening Verses of the Tantrasara of Abhinavagupta Alexis Sanderson Verse 1 vimalakalasrayabhinavasystimahd janant Pharitatanus cq pafcamukhaguptarucir janakah | tadubhayayamalasphuritabhdvavisargamayart hnydayam anuttardmrtakularh mama sarisphuratat \ May my heart shine forth, embodying the bliss of the ultimate, [for it is] {one with the state of absolute potential made manifest in the fusion of these two, the ‘Mother’ grounded in pure representation, radiant in ever new genesis, and the ‘Father,’ all-enfolding [Bhairava], who maintains the light [of consciousness] through his five faces)/ {formed from the emissions produced through the fasion of these tuo, my mother Viral, whose greatest joy wus in my birth, and my father (Nara|sithagupta, [when both were] all-embracing {in their union}. Itis an ancient convention in India that a literary composition should begin with a form of words that promotes its success by dispelling the hindering powers (vighndl) that strive to impede the completion of any pious endeavour.” Most commonly this auspicious beginning is a verse in which the author meditates on the deity of his personal devotion (istadeoatd, either expressing his homage and adoration (namasktrah) or praying for its favour and prospering influence (astroadah). The present verse, which precedes all but 1. For the function of the braces and typefaces in the translation of this verse see the second paragraph ofthe Appendix. 2, Already in the second century ac Pataali declares (Vydtaranamahatbhasya, vol. 1, p. 6, L28p. 7,12} tigate detryo mahatak SAstraughasye mangalartarh sidhasabdareaditok prayurte, mangaladni hi Sst prathantevirapurusakan’ bhavanty ayusmatpurusckani ca “Intent on success, the master (Katyayana] begins with the [auspicious] word sdaha-, in order to secure the success ofthis great mass of instruction, considering that works that begin with [words that promote] success (margalam) become well-known and have authors who triumph and enjoy long life’ The word magula, which { have translated ‘success’ denotes only the accomplishment of a goal whichis sanctioned by the virtuous; see Kaiyata ad loc: agarkittbisasiddhir marigalam. That which causes or promotes this success is termed a maigalan by extension (upactrena).90 Samarasya one of Abhinavagupta’s comprehensive works on the Trika’ exemplifies the second of these forms, being a prayer for enlightenment.* In accomplishing this preparative function it also encapsulates the teaching that is to follow. For the fusion of the deities that it invokes is the Trika’s ultimate reality; and it characterizes this fusion in terms that provide a brief but potent definition of that ultimate, namely, that it is, as we shall see, the undifferentiated essence of consciousness containing all reality, both inner and outer, in a state of absolute potential’ Indeed, it is precisely because the fusion of the deities is this ultimate that the verse could be believed to have the desired effect. For it expresses our author's immersing himself in his true identity and thereby achieving for a moment the state of enlightenment which alone can inspire and sustain a work that will expound the nature of that state and the means by which it may be realized. For the more sublime the goal of a pious endeavour the greater the resistance of the hindering powers; and when that goal is to bestow enlightenment through the recognition of ultimate reality, nothing less than the impression left by the direct experience of that reality can protect against distraction by the contrary impulses that will obscure it in the course of the conceptualization into which the author must descend for the benefit of his readers. Abhinavagupta explains this doctrine of preparatory immersion (samavesah) in the course of his comments on the verse with which Utpaladeva, his teacher's teacher, opens his [Soarapratyabhijnaviorti:* fe ca praksinamohasyapi mayasariskaravinioyttaSartrapranaprabhytigatapra- matpbhavasya pratyagatmanah prabhaveyur aptcchdvighdtaya, visesatal samastalokam abhyuddharturit parigrhitodyamasya .. . yathoktarit “vighndyuta- sahasrari tu parotsdhasamanvitam | praharanty aniSari jantoh sadvastoa- Dhimukhasya ca. visesato bhavambhodhisamuttaranakarinah” ityadi .. . iti pratyagatmani Sartradau tadrapatatiraskarendoanatirapena prathamasamaye parameSvarasvarapotkarsapardmarsatma samduesah . . . svikdryah. tatra hi sati 3. Malintjyeoartita, Partrisikaeicarane, Tantralota, Tantrastra, and Tantoccaya. Only the Tantravaadhonta tacks it 4. For these two forms of the verse for success (matgalam), the expression of homage and adoration (namasiarah) and the benediction (aSireddak) see Dandin, Kavyadaréa 1.14ed and Bhoja, Sorasoattanthabharana,p. 123, The commentators, citing Dandin, recognize a third category of verse for success, namely, that which is an indication of the subject-matter [to follow] (oastunndfah); but this is uncommon in religious works except as an incidental aspect of the other two. Whee it does ‘occur in a Siva text, itis argued thatthe sublimity ofthe subject is so great thatthe mere mention of itis suicient to dispel all would-be hinderers; see Bhatta Ramakantha on Noresaraparitd 11 5. TAV vol. 1 (1), p3, ll. 79, introducing this same verse in its occurrence atthe head of the Tanto: ta alu sastradge alaukikasiroadamubhena vaksyamanusadardhasAstrarthagarbhikarena samucitestedeoetan ‘asiakirahpardmpéati ‘Here, atthe beginning of the treatise, the author dzects his awareness to his appropriate chosen deity through an esoteric benediction that incorporates the teaching ofthe Trka that he will expound [in the course of the work) 6 IPVV vol.1, p.18,1L35,...9-12,... 1416... 182.A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 1 vigvam api sodtmabhitam abhinnasvatantrasartvinmatraparamdrthari bhavati. iti kak kasya kutra vighnah. anantararh tu granthakaranakale yadyapi pratyagatmapradhanyam evdnusaridheyam anyatha vaikharfparyantaprapti- niroahyasastraviracandnupapattes tathdpi tatsamtvesasariskaramahaujojajoalya- minanijaujahsamujjihdsitabhedagrahataya na prabhavanti vighna. 7 soarapotkarsa em. : svarapotkarsana Keo 12 samuijihasita em. : samujjhasita Keo [The hindering powers (vighnah)] are able to impede a person’s will even if he is free of delusion. For {while he remains in the world] the latent impressions of differentiated reality continue to influence him, with the result that he still projects the sense of self on to his body, vital energy, and [mind] [And he is] all the more [vulnerable to these powers] if, {as in Utpaladeva’s case, the reason for his remaining in the world is that] he has decided to strive to rescue mankind [from ignorance]. . . This is supported by the passage [of scripture] that begins “If a person undertakes a pious task, countless hinderers assail him day and night, and with great determination, especially if he is acting to rescue others from the ocean of incarnation. . . .” So initially, (before composing the treatise,] one should suppress identification with the body and the other levels of the individual self — this is the ‘bowing down’ [that characterizes homage] — and so enter the state of immersion (samavesah) in which one realizes the supremacy of the nature of ParameSvara. 7. These hinderers are defined by Abhinavagupta as follows in IPVV, vol. 1, p. 18, U1: adhyttmiadayo ‘navadhanadosadayas trividha upaghitastadadhighhatras ca devataviesak “The hinderers(oighndt) (to be dispelled) are such as the defect of distraction, that is, all the three kinds of affliction, mental (Adhyattmiar), {material (ahibhoutta)], and [supernatural (adhidavike)], and the various gods that empower them.’ CE Yogartia, Paramarthasdraiort,p.2, 11-2... athatadalasasaseydirapaighnaugha- ‘he multitude of hinderers, namely, such [states of mind] as hesitation, uneasiness, laziness, and uncertainty’; Siadtarmottra f.125t5-7 (12181-1836) on the hinderers of meditation (yopevighndh): Alayah vydheas ‘ord pramadastytna*srhsayah (er. + sarkSayah Cod.) | anavasthitcitlatoam asraddha Dhrantidarsanam: | ‘dubhani daurmanasyart ca visayesu ca land | ity eoamadikth prokta yogavighnal ‘Lassitude, serious ilnesses, negligence, apathy, uncertainty, lack of concentration, lack of confidence, hallucinations, pains, melancholy, and distraction by sense-objecs. Such as these are termed the hinderers of Yoga.’ For the deities that embody them see, e.g. Netratanra 19.6264, which refers to the 300,000 milion ‘hindering Vinyakas created by Siva from his thumb, and the site-protectors (Ksetrapdlas) thought to hinder a Siddhi-seeker’s practice if not placated that are mentioned and listed in the Aghorpatcaistakx quoted in Nityadsergrahapaddhat,f, Abv1-A5v2. In the latter passage see especialy f. 4iv3-4: upopthe fu sandohe tathtnyesaroatas sthith| kgetre kere pure pure grime grime vasanti te | adhikrar snails te Pi kuroanti palakah | vighnabkatas surdnah ca vtrdna siddhim icchatam | tapascchidrani kurvanti toarsayanti tu path “Yet others are found everywhere, in Upapithas and Sandohas. They dvell in every sacred place, town, and village. They exercise their office as protectors under the command of Siva, As hinderers of gods and adepts seeking powers they cause fatal flaws in one's ascetic practice, but remove [these obstacles] if they are worshipped. 8 Abhinavagupta alludes to the opening of Utpaladeva’s Isearapratyabhijnakarla:kathencid asaya rmahefvarasya dasyarh janasyapy upakaram icchan | semastasaripatsamavdptihetur tatpratyabhijiam upaptdaytmi ‘Having miraculously achieved the status of a slave of Siva, and desiring to benefit mankind I shall bring about his recognition, the cause ofthe attainment of all success.”92 Siimarasya - "During this [immersion] the universe too is one with this true self, being nothing in its ultimate reality but undivided and autonomous consciousness. So [while the state continues] what can impede whom, and where? Thereafter, when one is producing the text, one has to focus on the individual self, since otherwise one would be incapable of composing the treatise, which can be accomplished only if it is brought down to the level of articulate speech. But [then] the hinderers have no power [to impede one], because one’s inner force, which [now] blazes [more] intensely under the influence of the greater power of the impression of that state of immersion, has inspired one to abandon one’s [earlier] faith in the state of differentiation. ‘The opening benediction, then, is to be read as testimony of the act of self-realization that enabled the work to proceed unhindered to its completion. But this is not its whole meaning. Both types of opening verse express immersion in the ultimate nature of the self, but whereas verses of homage and adoration (namaskirah) do so more or less directly, verses of benediction (aSirvddah), such as this, do so only by implication. To the extent that they describe the deity they imply an act of immersion in its nature; but their explicit reference is to an act of prayer for a state that is yet to be accomplished (sidhye-). Furthermore, benedictory verses are always altruistic in intention. They are prayers that the deity act for the benefit of others, usually the audience or, more impersonally, the whole world or the virtuous." Occasionally the author includes himself among the beneficiaries, but I know of no instance in which the beneficiary is the author alone." Thus, though Abhinavagupta leaves the beneficiaries unstated in this verse, the force of convention conveys that he is praying either exclusively or inclusively for the enlightenment of others. Which of these does he intend? Does he include himself among the beneficiaries? Or is he excluding himself, praying that we may attain the enlightenment that is already his? His exalted status in the tradition might be taken to support the latter reading. Yet I propose that itis the inclusive reading that he wished to 9. Any auspicious recital of a verse of homage (namaskiraslokak) must embody two aspects, humble devotion to the deity and sincere conviction of the deity’s supremacy (utkarsai), though only one or the other is usually explicit, the first with such expressions as nami “I bow to...» the second with such expressions as jayati or ofjayate'... is supreme.’ This principle is formulated by Utpaladeva in his [Goarapratyabhijnavit, in a passage quoted by Abhinavagupta in IPVV vol. 1, p. 8, 12-13; see also IPV, vol. 1, pp. 68; and Mahesvaranands, Maharthanaariparimala p. 5, U. 5-13. 10, Reference tothe audience isthe commonest form ("May the deity ... you (oak). This is what we find, for example, in all but 14 of the 109 benedictory verses included in the anthology of Jalhana (Sidtimuttaalt, pp. 16-35), and in all but 5 of the 74 in that of Vallabhadeva (Subhaitoal, pp. +18). “The world’ (iagat, jagat), ‘the worlds’ (aganti) or “the three woslds’trijagat, trio) are the next most frequent beneficiaries (7/109, 2/75). Once in Jalhana's collection (2.24) they are ‘the virtuous! sya sate mohark mahabhsiraoak "May Mahabhairava remove the delusion ofthe virtuous,’ cf. the ‘commentary on the Old Kashmiri Mahinayaprata, p. 1, v1... Sdn das... basta sat May the quiescent state .. . become manifest to the virtuous.” 11, The form is then ‘May the deity... us (nah)’ This occurs twice in Jalhana’s collection (258 and 281). 12, Nor-mention of the beneficiaries is seen five times in Jalhana's collection and thrice in Vallabhadeva's,A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 93 convey, namely, “May my heart shine forth in its fullness for us all.” This accommodates the doctrine stated in the passage quoted above that even those who have achieved enlightenment must constantly reinforce it through acts of immersion (samavesah) while they remain in the body. If he thought this was necessary for the venerable Utpaladeva he would certainly have thought it necessary for himself. But more importantly, it is this alternative alone that accommodates what I take to be the natural implication of his silence, namely that the distinction between self and other is ultimately unreal, that self and other are merely the modes of appearance of the true self (“my heart”) that expresses itself as all consciousness and its objects. The basis of this implication must be the alternative that includes both self and other. “My heart,” then, is not Abhinavagupta’s heart as opposed to that of others who are yet to be enlightened but rather the core of his, being which is the core of all beings. Or we may say that “my heart,” mama hrdayam, is intended to mean “the heart of the ‘T’,” that is the innermost awareness (vimarsah) that animates all manifestation (prakasah)."* The same analysis will apply to the implied pronoun “us” in “May my heart shine forth in its fullness {for us all].” For within Abhinavagupta’s Saivism “we” can only mean the plurality of “I”s projected by and in the one “1.” This, then, is the purpose of the verse. Through it Abhinavagupta expresses his own. immersion in the true self as the precondition of successful exposition and at the same time prays for enlightenment, both for his own, that its prospering influence may sustain his work as he descends for our benefit into the unenlightened state of conceptual thought, and that we his audience may attain the same enlightenment in our turn, suggesting through the impersonality of the benediction that he and we are ultimately the one self, indeed that the deity and the beneficiaries of its favour are identical in the highest consciousness. But the verse also exists to empower those who undertake to teach or study the work after its completion. We too are to contemplate its meaning in order to experience to the extent of our capacity the non-dual consciousness that alone can hold at bay the powers 13, _Jayaratha recognizes the second of these meanings in his commentary on the verse as it occurs atthe beginning of Abhinavagupta’s Tantrloka (TAV vol. 1 (1, p. 4, 1-2): mamatmano krdayart.. tthyart twsiu the heart, the realty, of me, ie. of the self. 14, In suppor ofthe proposition that he includes himself among the beneficiaries one may cite the prayer for enlightenment that opens his commentary on the second section of Utpaladeva’s Isoarapratyabhijaharta, There too he prays inclusively, saying “May the glorious husband of Gauri reveal theultimate reality to us...” (PV vol. 2, p. 1, v.ld:... praktayatu nah Srindn gaurpatih sa rar ara). And in support of a non-dualistic interpretation of this inclusive prayer, namely, that “we” means “I” in the plural, the plurality of “I°s that are the aspects the one true “I,” we may cite Bhaskarakantha's commentary on that prayer: ‘May he reveal to us, that i, to the agents of awareness ‘who being aspects of him are the object of limited “I” [-consciousness], the ultimate, all-ontaining reality that is his nature’ (Bhaskar vol. 2, pal, U. 20-21: param ant nijasvardpdkhyar: par satya casta nah sodisabhatanark parimitaharkoiseytnarh pramsdtPyartprakatayatu ...)94 Samarasya that would have impeded Abhinavagupta’s progress and will now try to impede ours as. ‘we attempt to follow him." The reader is invited to re-activate the awareness that inspired and sustained the original act of composition, reading the verse as though it were his own, reaching towards his true identity and praying for the enlightenment of all others, both those who are his contemporaries and those that will follow. Thus the contemplation of the verse evokes not only the non-duality of consciousness in the timeless, metaphysical sense, but also the non-duality of the transmission of enlightenment through time from generation to generation. As Abhinavagupta says, the lineage is to be understood as a single state of being within which individual identities are incidental and irrelevant. This is the basis of the doctrine that the guru lineage and the deity are one and the same, and the justification of the injunction that the initiate must look upon the guru as the deity incarnate. Let us now consider more closely the terms in which the ultimate reality is expressed in the verse. The “heart” that Abhinavagupta contemplates and whose contemplation he invites, is his own consciousness in its ultimate, universe-enfolding nature as the non- dual essence of the union of Siva and his innate power (Saktih). This union is presented as the inseparability of the manifest (prakasah) and its representation (vimarsah). Siva, the manifest (prakasah), is consciousness as the constant and totality of manifestation seen without reference to its modes. Representation (vimarsal), his power, is that by means of which this ever-manifest consciousness appears in those modes, representing itself variously as the differentiated reality of common experience (thedahijas the aesthetic y / synthesis of that plurality within the unity of self-awareness (bhedabheda), as non-duality (abhedah) through the complete retraction of that plurality, and, ultimately, as the state 15, For the benefit ofthe margalam to teachers (oytkhyataah) and students (GrolaaH) see Abhinavagupta’s comments on the Divanyaloka’s opening verse in his Dkoanydlotalocana ad loc. Cf. in a Buddhist context, Karnakagomin’s comments in his -tikt on the opening verse of Dharmakirt’s Prananavartikarti. See also Vytkarayamahabhasya vol. 1, p. 7,12, in which Patatjal, continuing the passage quoted and translated above (n. 1), adds that the purpose of Katyayana's auspicious frst Word is also to promote the success of those who will study his work (adkyetaé ca siddhttha yatha sy it. 16, TA 1283-50; Mahtrthamatjarparimala p. 95, 12-p. 96, L.A tata ea parasanitseabaa Sigurapan it tatperyrthah. tata esr “bahutoam: ela (cor. : bahutoom. etat Ed.) tattoortiyd na seigacchate koala tatadupadhyupastegavatad aupacrikatayaivangsriyate ythaikam eon vastu darpanasalilataiadyadharabhedat tatha tata praibimbati. bahutoavaccharidyupardgo ‘pi na Bhedaprathdm upaptdayat yathoktam mayaioaSr- Pldukodaye “tatra yat pajyam asmakamh Sakti mandala mahat | svaoabhaotmake Sembhau tt kisah parycvasyati | so ‘pi deve gurau soltmany aikatmyam upagacchati” ... iti ‘And so the gist is that the venerable line of [the Krama’s] gurus is of the nature of all-containing awareness, Therefore their [apparent] plurality is notin accord with the way they are in reality, It is accepted only figuratively, by virtue of association with diverse adventitious conditions, just as a single thing casts a variety of reflections because of the difference between the surfaces [on which it appears), such as a ‘water or oi. The fact that [the guru lineage] is affected by bodies and the like that are plural does not cause any [true] plurality to appear [here], as I myself have taught in [my] Padukodaye: “The whole vast ctcle of powers that we are to worship there is inthe final analysis the Siva that constitutes the essence of the self. And he is one with the venerable guru and {the worshipper] himsel”’A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 95 of absolute potential (visargah) in the core of consciousness, the ‘ultimate non-duality’ (paramadvayam, parddvaitam) that contains all these modes in a timeless simultaneity.” The essence of that union, the “heart,” is the manifest represented in this mode of higher non-duality, the state in which the manifest and representation are perfectly fused in the undifferentiated but all-inclusive totality of absolute potential. This state of fusion constitutes the very essence of consciousness. It is ever present as the basis of all experience. The “mother grounded in pure representation, radiant in ever-new genesis” is the power of representation itself." It is pure, because though it manifests the factors of time, place, and form that delimit contracted consciousness it is not subject to them itself, being the inexhaustible freedom of consciousness to appear in any configuration or in none. The “father, all-enfolding (Bhairava]” is Siva as the totality of this manifestation; and his “five faces” are the five powers by virtue of which this manifestation is sustained: consciousness, bliss, will, cognition, and action.® When these two are fused, that is to say, when their natural state of fusion becomes manifest in the process of immersion (samavesah), consciousness rests blissfully in itself alone, having withdrawn the modes of extroversion in which it appears to reach out towards what is other than itself. In terms of the modes of plurality, synthesis, and non- duality it shines forth here as the state of higher non-duality that knows itself as the ground and substance of all three; and in terms of the five powers of manifestation it shines forth as the first two, consciousness and bliss, or more exactly as consciousness blissful (nirorta) through fusion with itself, the powers of will, cognition, and action having been withdrawn and dissolved within this state as their ground and source. Saying that this reality embodies “the bliss (literally ‘the nectar’) of the ultimate” 17, This non-duality of the manifest is ‘higher’ (parama-, para-) in the sense that it does not exclude plurality; see MVV 1.108; 1.122-123 (parddvaitam); 1.615-631 (paramadvayadrstih (1.631); 1.982¢ (paramcidesita-); 1.1132 (arthe paramadvayasundare; 2.17e-19 (paremadoayadrstih and paradvaitam); 2.151 (— TA 4275) (ehairavtyeparamadvayarcanam); 2270; 2329 (paramadoayaoijanam). 18. Cf, TAV vol. 1 (2), p. 5, I 15-16, where Jayaratha, commenting on this same verse in its occurrence at the beginning of the Tantalok, takes @rayoh ‘ground’ or ‘basis in the compound vimkalasayl to be equivalent to soarapam ‘nature,’ ‘identity’: ‘whose ground, ie. identity, is...” 19, I take bharitatanuh (Yallcontaining,” lit. “whose form is fll”) to imply the name Bhalrava, as intended to be understood as a semantic analysis (nrvacanam) of that name. For this analysis cf. PTV p. 266, 7 (Keo p. 233): bhaiaoatma bhartakaram:; Vinanabhairaca 15 (bhariaiara bharaot) and 23 (ytasthd bard Bhairavasyopalabhyate; cf. Urmikaularnava f. 7¥8-9 (1.157e-158b): “pair (corr. : pani Cod.) hastart rahttyugrar Bairaarh vtrayakam | bharitdesthayt tasyabhaiaot sd vidhtyte); Kulastraf,SSv: “iar (com. :Biraoa Cod.) | tharitars tena caesar; Churmsarketapraka f. 76-7 (v.98): oy tu samdytit nirdvaranadharmint | bhairaoasyamittlokabharitasya nirdhytek; and the unattributed quotation in TAV vol. 1 (1), p. 143, 1% bharanat bharitasthith. 20. See TAV vol. 1 (1), p. 7, ll 2-5 (ad loc). The five powers are called faces through their equation with the five faces of iconic Bhairava, namely, Tatpurusa (E, front), Sadyojata (W, reat), Vamadeva (N, proper lef), Aghora (S, proper right), and Isana (upper). For this equation see MVV 1.169c-171b; and Keemarija, SoTU vol 1 @),p. 54, IL 23.96 Samarasya (anuttardmytakulam)® Abhinavagupta alludes to its definition in the alphabetic code which he will expound in the third chapter of this work. In those terms, the “ultimate” (anuttarah) is the first sound, the short vowel a, and “bliss” (anandah) is the second, the long vowel 2, understood as the fusion of two short a-s. Of these two the first is the ultimate in the masculine gender (anuttarah), Siva as undifferentiated manifestation (prakaSal); and the second is the ultimate in the feminine gender (anuttard), the representation (vimarsak) or creative intuition (pratibha) of that ultimate, the innate urge of manifestation to represent itself as the universe. Abhinavagupta's “heart” is “bliss,” the long 4, because itis the bliss of self-containment that arises when the ultimate and its power combine in a state of fusion (yamalam, sarighattah), that is to say, when manifestation immersed in itself alone experiences infinite bliss in the relish of its state of absolute potential (visargat). As evidence in favour of this interpretation of the heart I offer two passages from Abhinavagupta’s earlier works on the Malintoijayottara: Malinfoijayavarttika (1.15-23) and Tantraloka (3.67- 69). The first: aniyantritasadbhavad bhavabhedaikabhaginah | yat prig jatarit mahdjfidnark tad rasmibharavaibhavam W115 1 tatamh tadrk svamaylyaheyopadeyavarjitam | vitatibhavandcitraraémitamatrabheditam 16 M abkimarsasvabhavarn tad dhrdayart paramesituh | latrapi Saktya satatamt svdtmamayya mahesvarak 1117 W yoda sarighattam asadya samdpattirk pardri vrajet | tadasya paramari vaktrarh visargaprasardspadam N18 W anuttaravikasodyajjagadanandasundaram | thavivaktravibhagena bijamt sarvasya yat sthitamt 1119 W hytspandadykparasaranirntmormyadi tan matam | etat parart trikamt parvart sarvasaktyavibhagavat 1120 It atra bhavasamullasasankasarnkocavicyutih | svinandalinatdmdtramatricchakarmadrktrayam 1121 \\ tatha ca guravah Saivadystav ittharh nyarapayan | sa yadaste cidahladamatranubhavatallayah 122 W fadicchd tdvatt jftanarh taoat tavat kriyd hi sa | susaksmasaktitritayasamarasyena variate N23 W cidrapahladaparamas tadabhinno bhaved itit 15d vaibhavam J,, HaNNeDER : bhairavam J, after correction, KeD 16a atari corj. ‘SANDERSON (in HANNEDER) : tatas Ke 21, analyse this as an exocentric compound with kulam in the meaning ‘body’ (anuttartmytani kala Sartram asy); cf. TAV vol. 2 (3), p. 76, 1.7 glossing akulah: akaraltsanartkulav Sriram asa. For this meaning see the unidentified Kaula scripture cited in TAV ad 29.4 kuarhSariram ity ukto For amiam and synonyms in the meaning ‘bliss’ (2nandah) see, e.g, Kjemardja, Sivastrotrvaltivri on 12.40 (amptam anandah); 12.64 (sudhasadanam anandadhama); 12.17a (amtasya paramdnandasye); 13.50 (Chavadadoayamptakhyates toadaikyanandaprathayah)A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 7 2 24 The supreme awareness that has arisen before (all others] from the unlimited [ground] that contains all things in their pure non-duality is manifested all- pervading in the plenitude of its powers, sharing the nature of that ground, [still] free of the hierarchy of goals that it will appropriate [at lower levels], differentiated only inasmuch as the radiance it emits is diffracted in the process of its expansion. This, whose nature is the power of representation itself, is the heart (hrdayam) of Siva. In this state he attains the highest non-duality by experiencing intimate union with the power that is eternally one with his nature, When this occurs, the highest ‘face’ arises, the ground in which absolute potential (visargah) flows.” It is the seed of the universe, beautiful with the all-embracing bliss (jagadanandah) that surges up in the expansion of the ultimate, holding in non-duality all the ‘faces’ that will subsequently emerge. It is this that is meant [in the scriptures] by such terms as the Heart (ht), the Subtle Motion (spandak), Apperception (drk), the All-embracing [power] (para), the Essence (sdram), the Nameless (nirndma), and the Wave (armik)® This is the ultimate triad [of the Trika], the prior [state] that holds all [other] powers within its unity. Here the contraction caused by the inhibition of consciousness through the emergence of [differentiated] entities hhas fallen away, and the three [powers] that are the conscious subject’s (maty- ) will, cognition, and action have become nothing but that subject's state of immersion in his own bliss (svdnandalinata).* The master [Somananda] taught this, when he declared in his Sivadrsfi (1.3-4), “When one rests immersed in the experience of the unmingled bliss of one’s consciousness, then one's will, cognition, and action are no more [than that experience]. One exists as the fusion of these three powers in their subtlest from. At that time one is undivided, completely immersed in the bliss that is consciousness (cidrapahladg}.” ‘Abhinavagupta uses the term ‘face’ (cakiram) here because his context is an exposition ofthe process through which consciousness conceives and manifests the streams of Saiva revelation, their emergence being traditionally associated with the five faces of Sadasva. These faces are equated in the MVV with aspects of Siva's power, the streams being presented as the natural expressions of Sivahood in these aspects The hear is the sixth or highest face: and as the embodiment of absolute potential tis seen as the source of the non-dualistic teachings of the Trika. For other lists of such terms see, e., Tantrasara p. 27: tata paramesvarah parnasamvitsoabhacah prpataiodsye Sakti kulars samarthyane rmirkpdayarh sara spando vbhatis tisk kat *kargin (core Aargont Keo) carat oan bhogo dk nitytyadibhir agamabhasabhis tattadonvarthapravrtabhirabhidhiyate ‘in that [practice] Paramesvara is al-containing consciousness. The Power that is his [consort is nothing but ths comprehensiveness. I is she that is meant by such scriptural terms as the Totality, Potential the Wave, the Heart, the Essence, the Subtle Motion, Pervasive Glory, the Ruler of the Three [Goddesses], Kali, the Retractor [of Time] ((Kalasach{karsini), the Furious (Cant), the Word, Experience, Apperception, and the Etemal (Nitya) TA 3.49 (quoted below); Spandasaridoa p. 5, IL 12; Spandaniraya p. 66, UL, 69. Jayaratha, TAV vol 1 (1), p. 7, UL 11-13, defines the ‘ultimate triad’ (param tikam) asthe fusion of Siva snd Saki taktsoighatih), ie,we must presume, Siva, Sakti and ther fusion (ee and 2. It is dear that he thinks this is what AbhiSavagupta means here, because he cites these verses (MVV 1.17-20) immediatly ater the passage containing this definition (TAV vol. 1 [1], p. 7, L 1p. 8 L 5). However, the context indicates that the trad intended is rather that of the three powers will, knowledge, and action. CE. MVV 1.391639. 4 ,98 Samarasya The second: itthare vigoam idarh nathe bhairavtyacidambare | pratibimbant alarit svacche na khalv anyaprasadatah N65 1 ananyapeksita yasya vigvdtmatvart prati prabhoh | {dri pardrt pratibharh devith samgirante hy anuttardm N66 l akulasyasya devasya kulaprathanasalint | aulikt sa para Saktir aviyukto yaya prabhul N67 tayor yad yamalark raparit sa samghatta iti smytal | anandasaktih saivokta yato viSoari visrjyate 168 pardparat parari tattuart sais dev? nigadyate | tat sdravit tac ca hydayart sa visargah parah prabhuh N69 1 So this universe is a reflection in the Lord, in the perfectly reflective void of Bhairava's consciousness, [and arises) under the influence of nothing outside [that consciousness). This ability of the Lord to embody himself as the universe without drawing on anything outside [his own nature] is the supreme goddess that [our masters] call ‘creativity’ (pratibhart), ‘the feminine ultimate’ (anuttardrt) It is the supreme Power of Universality (Kaulikt Saktih), the ability of this (asya) deity (devasya) [Bhairava] {embodied in the sound a (akulasya)|#* to manifest the universe (kulaprathanaSalin?) [though] (transcending it (akulasye)}, the power with which the Lord is ever one (aviyukto yaya prabhuh), ‘The Power of Bliss (dnandasaktih) [=A] is the combination (yamalam rapam) of these two, the ‘passionate embrace’ (sarighaffah) out of which the universe is emitted [into consciousness]. This is the [ultimate] reality beyond both the universe-transcending and the universal (pardparat parart tattoam).” It is ‘the Goddess’ (devt) ‘the Essence’ (saram) and ‘the Heart.’ It is the highest (parah), omnipotent (prabhul) state of absolute potential (visargah). The heart that Abhinavagupta invokes as the source of inspiration and the goal to be realized is, then, the state of absolute potential (visargali) in which the three powers of will, cognition, and action, and the three modes of plurality, synthesis, and non-duality, are fused in blissful, all-embracing consciousness. 2. 2, ” 2 TA 34549. Cl. the parallel passage in his eater MVV (1890-894) Take the single word atlas here toe intended to mean both ‘other than the sat of university (halen) and having #28 ts body; following Jayarstha ad loc, vol. 2 (3), p 5, 1516 and p. 76 7 CL MVV 1.990, where Abhinavagupta makes it clear thatthe “ulimate’ (antral) as Bharea is both the sound a and akula in the first ofthese two meanings: anutaarydraya parsharaaripinah | lula part yey ill tir uta CL. TAV ad loc., vol. 2, p. 82, Il 9-10: pardd vifoottiredc chaivad rapad aparad visnamayae chibi rapat param parnam ‘Puller (parnars ( one liberationA Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 101 It might be thought that in making this the object of his prayer Abhinavagupta has abandoned the convention that such verses should invoke the author's chosen deity (isfadeouta) For it would appear that this heart is no deity at all, but at best the ground in which Bhairava and his power mingle and lose their separate identities. But the breach of convention is only apparent. For at the centre of Abhinavagupta’s pantheon of contemplation and worship is a deity embodying this heart. He is merely leaving the reader to recognize it for himself: like the reality it personifies, it is pervasive but veiled. ‘The Mandala that enthrones the Trika’s deities and symbolizes their interrelation is a trident with a lotus above the cusp of each of its three prongs. On these lotuses three goddesses are installed: Para in the centre, Pardpard to her right, and Apard to her left. In the Trika of the Devydyamala, however, there is a fourth goddess, Kalasamkarsint (the Destroyer of Time), who is installed above Para as the ultimate ground. In the Trika of the Malinfujayottara, the explicit basis of the group of works to which the Tantrastra belongs, there are only the three goddesses; but there are two forms of Paré, her common form and Matysadbhava (‘The Essence of the Mother Goddesses’ or, as the non-dualists preferred to gloss it, ‘The Essence of the Conscious’), and Abhinavagupta, influenced by the Devyfytmala and cognate traditions, took the second to be the Devyaydmala’s fourth goddess under another name, that is to say, a higher aspect of Para in which she subsumes her lower aspect along with Parapara and Apara.* Now the powers and modes are > element, the menstrual blood (értgoam), in the case of women. Now in TA 29.119¢-122b we are told that although in Kaula sexual union both partners simultaneously experience a state of emission that 's both quiescent (inwardly focused) and active (through ejaculation) santoditatmatcbhayardpapartmaria stmyayoge pi [121cd) only the woman can conceive and that itis for this reason that she has been said to be ‘one whose centre expands’ (pravishararamadhyapada Sakih Sastre ttak kahit (122ab). Jayartha (ed 29. 122-1236) explains that the reason for men’s inability to conceive is that they lack this expansion (nant ki madhyopadapravikaso nasty Asayal). The nature ofthis expansion is not clarified here but itis surely associated with the bliss of emission (nsargdnandah) that was mentioned in ths context in TA 572 cited above, Jayaratha comments on Abhinavagupta’s remark in TA 29.122ab that women are distinguished from men by this natural power of expansion by quoting the following verse: tisthet serrontsarth prirnarh stdhako nitaoratak | siddhir bhavat yd tsya 54 dinaikena yositim “The success that a sticly observant [male] practitioner can achieve in a whole year, can be achieved by women in a single day.’ I propose that our authors believed that women are endowed by nature with the capacity to experience a sexual climax of much greater intensity than that accessible to men and held that this explains both thelr greater ability to experience in Kaula practice the blissful ascent through the central channel (madhyadhima, susumnd) of the fire of the vital energy termed udtnak and their unique ability to conceive, The passage of the Janmamaranavicara cited above contains a citation from the Clcakesseramata, a post-Abhinavaguptan Saiva scripture known to Jayaratha, that begins as follows, echoing TA 5.72 (somasdryakaldjdlaparasparanigharsatah | agnisomatmake dhamni viserginanda unis!) somastryarasllssparasparanighargandt | jatavedas sarjate madhyadhamavitasn’ | “otrydrupa(em. : vrdruna Ke)parhumavasad ahkurasabhavak “The mutual friction of the expanding pleasure of the moon and the aun gives rise toa fire that causes the centre (madhyadhdma) to open up. This brings about a change in the [mingled] semen and menstrual blood, transforming them into the Bist state [ofthe embryo- tobe) 35. For the outline of this Mandala see Sanderson 1986, p. 171. 36, See Sanderson, 1986, pp. 192-194.102 Samarasya everywhere equated with the three goddesses. So the ‘heart,’ which is the fusion of those powers and modes,” is none other than this fourth goddess. And this equation, though tacit in the opening verse, is not so everywhere. For after identifying the state of bliss arising from the union of Bhairava and his power with ‘the essence,’ ‘the heart and ‘absolute potential’ (visargah), the passage of the Tantraloka quoted above continues as. follows: deviyamalasastre st kathita kalakarsint | mahadamarake yage Sripardmastake tathd 70 \ Sriparoasastre sa matysadbhavatvena varnita 70¢ Srfpardmastake corr., as quoted in TV vol. 9 (15), p. 125, 1. 12 : Sripara mastake Keo It is called Kala[sarhJkarsint in the Devyayamalatantra, in [the section on] the Great Damara Mandala, [where she is worshipped] above Para; and it is called Matysadbhava in the Malintoijayottaratantra. In locating reality at this point at which the three goddesses of the Trika and the triads they express are absorbed into the goddess Kalasarhkarsini Abhinavagupta reveals an important key to his tradition’s exegesis of the Trika, namely, that at its highest level its dynamics are none other than those of the Kaula Krama system followed by the practitioners of esoteric Kali worship. For Kalasarhkarsini has been imported into the Trika, or imposed on it, under the pervasive influence of that tradition. Abhinavagupta alludes to this Krama core of his Trika at vital points throughout his exposition of the system.” Verse 2 vitatas tantraloko vigahiturm naiva Sakyate sarvaih | rjuoacanaviracitam idarh tu tantrasdrart tateh Synuta I 37. Cl. the opening benediction of the [PV on which Abhinavagupta invokes ‘the heart that is one with the three divine powers’ (Srsaktititaytviyogi hrdayar) 38, TA 370-716, For the term yigoh in the meaning ‘that on which [the deities] are worshipped” (atrejyanta it yoga, that isto say, the Mandala, see, eg, Mrgendra, Kriydptda 8.136; TA 31.454, 460-472, and Sab. For the use of the term [maht]dimarayagak to denote the variant of the trident Mandala taught by the Devyiyinala see TA 31.100ab. For the use of the term to denote the section of the work in which that Mandala is taught see TA 15.335cd and Jayaratha on TA 370 39. CE. TA 3330-31, here equating the three goddesses with emission, stasis, and retraction: "purl parpard (core. : parapara para Keo) camya sytisthtitirdhayah | matrsadbhaoarapa tu turya vigrintirucyate | tac “eapratasarh (em. : ea prakasem Keo) vaktrasthah sitar tu pede pede ‘Para, Parapars, and Apard are emission, stasis and retraction. But the scriptures teach a fourth, the state in which they come to rest. This is Matyadbhva, This fourth level] is not explicit, being a matter for oral instruction. But I have alluded to it at every step.’ Cf. TAV vol 1 (1), p: 150, Ik 3+: trikane pardiakttrayathidhtyaar Sista. iramah eatustaydrthak "The Teika is the doctrine that teaches the three Powers Para, [Partpara, and Aparal, The Krama is the doctrine ofthe four [: emission, stasis, retraction, and the nameless)”A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 108 Not all are capable of mastering in depth my long Tantraloka. Study, then, this Tantraséra, which I have composed as a more straightforward [summary of the same subject]. ‘The Tantraloka (Light on the Tantras) is Abhinavagupta’s most extensive work of Saiva scriptural exegesis.” Entirely in verse it comprises nearly 6,000 stanzas; and these are succinct in style and technical in content. The Tantrasara is about one sixth as long and is written in simple prose interspersed with verses that conveniently summarize the matter covered in each section. It also presents its subject more smoothly, sparing the student much of the philosophical arguments, digtessions, elaborations, and accounts of alternative procedures that abound in the Tantrdloka.* The title Tantrasdra could mean ‘The Essence of the Tantras’;* but the structure of the verse strongly suggests that -sira here means not ‘essence’ but ‘summary,’ the summarized being the subject covered in the longer Tantrdloka. For Abhinavagupta states here that his Tantnaloka is both too difficult and too long for some and then recommends his Tantrasara as the remedy, that is to say, as both a less complicated and a shorter treatment of the same subject. Either he could leave the reader to understand for himself that he is recommending the work for both these reasons, or he could make both reasons explicit. What he cannot do is to state one but not the other. This he would be doing unless we take the second, that of brevity, to be conveyed by the title itself, as I have indicated in the portion of my translation placed within parentheses. The title may be rendered, then, as "A Shorter Exposition of the Tantras.'* Having clarified the meaning of the element -sara we may now consider the identity of the Tantras which the first part of the title identifies as the subject-matter of our work. Since Abhinavagupta refers here to the Tantras in general rather than to a more restricted 40, The Sansiit also permits the translation “Light ofthe Tantra’ Thus Raniero Gnoli published his translation of the work into Italian (1999) under the ttle Lace dei Tanta, Jayaratha gives bot this and “Light on the Tantas’ asthe meaning ofthe tile in TAV wo. 1 (1), p. 256, I 1618: tant tanner amerika ills tan aokayat praaaati ot “In the Tantrlks,.fn| this [ork] which 2s it were, the light of the Tantras taught by Siva, or which illuminates them.” 42, See the marginal annotations in Tantrastre ms, P: (1) sraihaitatitgnatarksastapariranais‘TNot all [are capable of mastering in depth my voluminous Tantralot}, since [not all] have the [necessary] traning in rigorous reasoning’ and (2) ttgnatarkahinytrjutd [The Tantrasdra] is straightforward because its fre from rigorous reasoning’ The annotator echoes the opening words of Ksemarij's Prayetitahrdaye, his simple outline of the philosophical and soterological doctrines of Utpaladeva's Uvarapratyabiakarika, where he says that his purpose isto introduce the essence of that system to ‘those of undeveloped intellect, who have not laboured in the rigorous discipline of reasoning’ (sutunramatayo itattgtarkastraparsrart). 42, Thus Raniero Gro entitled his Italian translation of the Tanrasrs (1990) Essenaa det Tent 48, This is how the title is understood by the glossator in Tantrastra ms. Py stram arthdtspena tact sailseak sar, ie. an exposition with the implication of [non-essential] topics, a summary’ The literal meaning of the second half of the verse is: ‘But this Tantrasdra has been composed in straightforward language. Study it, therefore”104 Samarasya group of texts, it would appear that he excludes only those whose exclusion could be taken for granted, that is to say, those that lie outside the boundary of his religion. The Tantras inside this boundary, that is to say, the Tantras that he recognized as valid instruction in the means of true salvation, might be thought to be those that teach the Trika. In that case the implied meaning of the title would be ‘A Shorter Exposition of the Tantras of the Trika.’ However, his canon of fully valid Tantric revelation extends far beyond the confines of this system to embrace all the Saiva Tantras, that is to say, all that have been propagated as the teaching of Siva (sivasasanam, Scivam). For though he holds the major divisions of this Tantric Saiva canon to be unequal in certain respects — he places the Trikatantras above the rest of the Bhairavatantras, and the Bhairavatantras above the Siddhantatantras — he perceives them nonetheless as equal and united in this fundamental sense that all teach the means of true and definitive liberation, whereas all non-Saiva Tantras and all non-Tantric scriptures, including those scriptures that advocate devotion to Siva for the uninitiated,“ offer goals that in reality are forms of bondage, being temporary states of reward, however exalted. He explains this greater unity of Saivism in the following passage of his Malintvijayavarttika: 44, Lefer to such works as the easiest version of the Skandapurds, recently edited by Bhattaii, and the texts of the Sivadherma cycle (Sivadharma, Sivadharmottara, Sivadharmasemgraks, Sivopanigad, UmamaheSvarasanoada, (Sivadharma-|Uttarottara, Vysasdrasarhgraha, and Dharmaputrika), which, with the exception of the Siopanisad, are sill unedited. The Sivopenigads misleading name caused it to be included (and concealed) among the Saivite Upanigads in Un-Published Upanishads, pp. 324-78, This literature concerns the religious practice of uninitiated, lay devotees (svabhatak, radrabiukta, usa) 45. The status of the pre-Tantric Saivism of the various Pasupata traditions was not a matter of universal agreement. According to our Kashmirian authors, following the authority of the Nioase and the Swcchands, the category of Siva's teachings (seassanam) does include the scriptures of these traitons. Its accepted that they have the power to lead ther followers to liberation atthe reality-level of Ivar This sa lower liberation (apard muti) than that attainable by those who have received fll inition (nirodnadlitga or sddhakaditsa) in any Saiva Tantra; but it is a true liberation. For it lies within the pure universe, ove the world-source (nd). Once here a soul cannot fall back, and in time it will se to the highest level, However, not ll PaSupatas were believed to reach the pure universe. The Paficrhika Padupatas, the Lakulas (also called Mahavratas and Kalamukhas), and the Vaimalas are sui to realize their scripture’ salvfic potential, but the Mausulas and Karukas are held to reach no further than the world source, that isto say, the reality-level that isthe upper limit of the impure universe. For though they follow valid scripture they have placed excessive emphasis on rites at the expense of gnosis. For this view of the Pasupata systems, of elements of it, see TA 37.13e-15; Nifeasagulye 7.2516-252 (f. {67¥23), 7263e-264b (f, 6706}, 7.269 (. 68r1-2); Ditgottar 18.123-125; oT 10.1134-1135b, SoTU aloes 5eT 1170-74, SoTU ad loc. A less generous view is found inthe Saiddhantika Paddhat' of Somasambha and in the Saiddhantika scripture Saroajanottara. According tothe frst the Pasupatas reach no higher than the world-source and according to the second they reach not even this level, being ‘berated’ in Time (kit), while other non-Tantre followers of Sava scripture, called Mahaveatas by the fist and Somasiddhantins by the second, are conceded true liberation by being asigned ta the level Vidy, jst beneath Isvara, in the pure universe; see Somasambhupaddhati vol. 3, p. 553, verse Sab; and Sareajanttara{, 3712: kealrtha"vidah (em. + vidlh Cod.) Kalam prprucantjtendrgth For kevalatast ~ >Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 105 tena vaisnavabauddhadisasanantaranisthitah | yatht samyan na mucyante na tathd Saivasariskytah 111.192 atimargakramakulatrikasrotontarddisu | paramesanasastre tu ye samyag diksitd narah 11193 1 tesarit naivdpavargasya labhe bhedo'sti kaScana | na caitadatirikto'pi moksopayo'sti kascana 1194 Kevalari kvdpy andyasdj jfoanmuktikramena ca | Sighram eva pard siddhir yathasmaddarsanesv iti W195 W koapi tattoavaltyogaparipattkramac cirat | tais taih kriyakalapais ca labhyate paramart phalam 11196 1195a andyasaj conj. SANDERSON (in HaNNeDER) : andyasa Codd. So those initiated in Saivism are truly liberated, and followers of other teachings, such as Vaignavism or Buddhism, are not. All individuals who have been properly initiated in the teachings of Siva, whether in a Pasupata system (atimdrgah), the Krama, the Kula, the Trika, or any other division, are equal in that all attain liberation. Nor is there any means of liberation outside these [teachings]. It is just that in some systems, such as ours, the ultimate perfection is achieved quickly and without struggle, through liberation in life, whereas elsewhere [in the Siddhanta and the Pasupata systems] the supreme goal is reached slowly, through a course of graded meditations in which one ascends from one reality-level to the next, and by means of various complex rituals. The Tantrasara, then, is ‘A Shorter Exposition of the [Saiva] Tantras.’ And this interpretation has the support of Jayaratha, who glosses the first element of the title Tantraloka in the same way. But if the Tantrasara is an exposition of the Saiva Tantras, the sense in which it justifies its ttle is not immediately obvious. For, in fact, neither it nor the antecedent Tantrdloka deals directly with Saiva Tantrism as a whole, either in general terms or by covering its various forms in sequence. Rather, both works are expositions of just one form of Saivism, the Trika, In the introduction (upodghatah) to his Tantraloka our author writes:” santi paddhatayas citrah srotobhedesu bhayasd | anuttarasadardharthakrame tv ekapi neksyate 114 W > inthe meaning Pancarthika consider the Tewar stone inscription of Gayakama, Cedi Sarat 902 = 20 UBL, Cll 4: 58, verse Se: dearyo ‘dbhutakevalarthavacasarh paicarthiko yak sudhh; and Viguddhamuni, Yamaprakarana 214-22b: visuddhamuninalpakem | kevalarthat samuddhrtya yamaprakaranar kta. 46. TAV vol. (1), p. 258, IL 16-18: tantraloke tantra paramesardnam aoka felts Ly Alokayt prakisyati Py 7. TALS.106 Samarasya ity ahari bahusah sadbhih Sisyasabrakmacaribhih | arthito racaye spastart pirparthamt prakriyam imam 15 1 Many different Guides are available for each of the [five Saiva] streams, but not one for the procedures of the Trika, the highest system of all (anuttarasad- ardharthakrame).* So, at the repeated request of my pious pupils and co-initiates, 1am composing this clear and comprehensive exposition [of that system]. ‘The Tantrasara, then, is a shorter ‘Guide to the Trika’ (*trikapaddhatih). Indeed, it is even more specialized than this. For as a Guide or Paddhat it must be based on a single work, and that, in this case, is the Malintoijayottara.® How, the reader will ask, can Abhinavagupta claim to be expounding the: Gea Tantras as a whole through the exegesis of a single Saiva Tantra within one specialized division of that canon? The answer is that he can do so because he holds — indeed in doing so he asserts — that the scriptures of the Trika contain the essence that animates all the branches of the Saiva canon, indeed ultimately all religion, and that this essence appears in the ‘Malintoijayottara in its purest form: Thus:® 99 eka evdgamas tasmat tatra laukikaSastratah | prabhrty a vaisnavad bauddhatc chaivat sarvayit hi nisthitam 130 1 tasya yat tat param prapyam dhama tat trikaSabditam | sarvavibhedanucchedat tad eva kulam ucyate 31 1 Raniero Gnoli has translated anuttaasadardhtrthalrame ‘forthe school of the Unsurpassed, forthe Trka, and for the Krama (per la scuola del Senza Superiore, per il Trika per il Krama’ (195% 6). The Tantra draws on the Krama; but by no means can it be considered a Paddhat ofthat system. As for the Anuttara (‘the Unsurpassed’), ie. the form of the Trika taught on the basis ofthe Parris, its ritual procedures are altogether absent from the Tantraloka. My understanding of the compound is also that of Jayaratha; see TAV vol. (1) p. 52. 58: prathamaokapancaksitrito‘mutarasadardhrthatrana ity nena sakgadabhisite ca trikrthas toad abkidheyah “The subject [of the Tantra i the Trika, which has been implied by the five opening verses and expressly stated in the expression anuttarasadardharthakrame in 14) TAL. 17; na tad asthe yon na Srmdinejayottare | devadevena nirdigtarssoasshdenathaligatah There is nothing in this [Tantralok] that has not been taught by Siva in the Malintijyottaratanta, either ‘explicitly or by implication,” Likewise, he refers to his Tantraloa as a versifed analytic commentary (oct) on the Malinojiayotara, calling the later the Saardha, i. te Trikatontm in IPVV vol 1, p. 33, L. 2s Srigadardhaslokertie tantralke ‘A Paddhati literally a ‘Guide’ is defined as follows by the Saiva authority Bhatt2 Ramakantha, Sindhatrititatottaraorti p. 45, lk. 6-7 paddhatpratisstrarh viksiptasya Srtasyt“ttsdmarthytsiptasye (em. : tatsamarthyat ksiptasya Bhatt) ca mantratantranusthtndya “sartsepat (em. :sarksepa Bhatt) “leamenabhidhenarn (em, 1 kramenabhidhinad Bhatt) yojurvedadau yajtasitradivat ‘For any scripture @ PPadahati is a text that enables the performance ofthe rituals [ofthat scripture] along with the mantras [that accompany them] by succinctly arranging in the order (of performance] (i) the [instructions] explicitly stated [in that scripture but] dispersed in various places (throughout its length, and (i) whatever [els] those explicit statements imply. An example is the Yjfastra in the case the (Kathaka] Yajurveda.’ On the relation between scriptures and Paddhatis see Sanderson 2005a, pp. 352-7 TA 3530-34 a‘A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 107 yathordhvadharatabhaksu deharigesu vibhedisu | kart pranitam evar syat trikarh sarvesu Sastratah N32 érimatkalikule coktarit paficasrotovivarjitam: | daststadaSabhedasya stram etat prakirtitam 33" puspe gandhas tile tailari dehe jfvo jale 'mrtam | yathd tathaiva Sastranarit kulam antal pratisthitam 34 1 ‘There is but one revelation (dgamah) within which all [religion] is grounded, from the mundane [Vedic religion] to Vaignavism, Buddhism, and Saivism. ‘And the ground of that revelation, the ultimate goal [of religion], is the Trika, Because of its consistent non-duality it is also called the Kula. Just as there is one vital breath in [all] the limbs of the body, though each is distinct and lower or higher, so the Trika is present in all scriptures. And for this we have the authority of the Kallkula: “It has been declared that this teaching trans- _. cends the five streams as the essence of the ten and eighteen [Siddhanta- tantras). The Kula resides within the (Saiva] scriptures like the scent in a flower, the oil in a sesame seed, the soul in the body, or the nectar of life in water.” And: daststadasavasvastabhinnark yac chasanari vibhoh | tatsdrart trikasastrarh hi tatsirarh malinimatam Wt The essence of the Lord’s teaching in his ten and eighteen [Siddhantatantras] and sixty-four [Bhairavatantras] is the Trika; and the essence of that is the ‘Malintvijayottara, This view of the relation between the Trika and the rest of Tantric Saivism is, of course, a correlate of the metaphysical doctrine that the higher contains the lower until at the highest level everything is subsumed within the state of absolute potential invoked in our opening verse. Just as that state is the highest, all-containing reality, so in the parallel theory of revelation the Trikatantras are the purest expression of that state and the most immediate means by which it may be realized. As for the other branches of the Saiva revelation, they are understood as expressions of that same state when it has undergone subtle differentiation through the projection into prominence of one or other of its hitherto latent powers. By expounding the Malintuijayottara, then, Abhinavagupta can claim to be expounding the whole Saiva revelation in its undifferentiated essence: whatever appears outside the Trika is merely the Trika inflected by a limiting context. 51, CE. Kalfoapaneatttef, 30-v (235-380): ead ray paramarh Kul jatar a kena i | Sind thy lam devs pacesrotovinirgatam 136 dasttadesabhedasy Sivasyaparamefoars | antarlmam ida jana jt ridasesarah 7 W sareara stl deon sugar kala uttamam | pspe ganda iedoktas ta ydoat i198 tathaiow saroatstrnh kala antahpraithita, 52. TA 1.18. See also TA 37.13c-26; MVV 1.391-399, 53, This isthe point of MVV 115-99.108 Samarasya One might think that in a text based on such a vision of the canon it ought not to be necessary to look beyond the higher to the lower. Indeed it might seem improper to do so. The presence of Tantras other than those of the Trika ought, then, to be purely theoretical in the manner explained. In practice, however, Abhinavagupta does draw heavily on Saiva Tantras outside his narrow focus, and in this way he gives his works something of the comprehensiveness promised by their titles. This is sometimes because he wishes to emphasize that certain doctrines are characteristic of the entire canon* and sometimes to confirm the non-dualistic perspective of the Trika by showing that it can be recognized even in texts far removed from this source, texts that those who recognize no higher authorities consider strictly dualistic. Abhinavagupta accepts that Siva has taught dualism in these texts® but he seeks to assert his view of the canon by showing that Siva has left traces even there of the non-dualistic awareness that he claims to be the source of all the Tantras and the explicit teaching of the highest * But there is another reason for his looking beyond the Trikatantras, and this is that the highest Tantras within the canon, though they are the most universal in terms of doctrine — their non-dualism subsumes and transcends the dualism of the lower scriptures —, are the least universal in the scope of their injunctions. For the canon is seen as a single complex utterance in which the instructions in the lower Tantras apply on the higher levels unless they are countermanded by more specific instructions. It follows that in order to translate the teachings of a text like the Malin?vijayottara into action it is necessary to supplement it by reading in information from lower levels. The rule for such supplementation is that where the base text is concise or silent whatever is needed is to be drawn from the highest source possible. One is to look first to texts of the same class (samna-), then to related texts (samdnakalpa-) within the corpus of Bhairava- tantras, and finally, if that is necessary, to the altogether unrelated (atyantasamana-) Siddhantatantras which form the lowest and most universally applicable level of injunction in the canon, Jayaratha sets out the principle and illustrates its application with reference to ‘Malinioijayotiara 8.16. That verse instructs the initiate to make offerings to the deities who preside over the door to his shrine and then to cast in a flower over the threshold before he enters. Jayaratha explains that in order to act on this instruction the worshipper needs to know the names, order, and locations of the deities around the door, and also the ritual hand-gesture with which he is to accomplish the throwing of the flower. Since 54, See, eg, TA 1157-8, where Abhinavagupta points out that though the Saiva eanon (paramesarasistram) slstinguishes Siva and his powers it does not consider them to be separable in the sense in which the property-holder (dharma) and’ its properties (dharmah) are separable for the Vaiseskas 55. See, eg, TA 1.194 (douitasstregu); 1224 (doaiaststre mataigadan) 56, Thus, in the introduction (upodghatah) to TA (122-106) see $9-62b ‘Kamila’ 62-65 (Ditgottrtdi’ see Ditgottara, Patalas 2-3); 66 (’Kémika’); 75-77 (‘Kiraya’). Cf. MVV 1.196c-197b (‘Kalapade’ = Sardhatrieriaiottara 8.74)A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 109 these details are nowhere to be found in the Malintoijayottara itself he must look beyond it, starting with the most closely related (samutna-) sources, that is to say, the other Tantras of the Trika, The names, order, and locations of the deities are encountered in the Trika’s Trisirobhairavatantra, So for these he need look no further. But for the method of casting the flower he has to descend to the Svacchandatantra, a text outside the Trika but nonetheless of the same general type since it is a Bhairavatantra rather than a Siddhantatantra. A passage in that text (2.26-27) informs the worshipper that he should throw the flower with the ‘arrow gesture’ (nardcamudra); but it does not tell him how to make it. To supply this information Jayaratha tums to the Anantavijaya, a scripture which he assigns to the Siddhanta class and therefore places at the greatest possible distance within the canon from the text it is to supplement.” In attempting to write a comprehensive Guide (Paddhati) to Tantric practice on the basis of thé Malintvijayottara Abhinavagupta has indeed been obliged on several occasions sianTAV v3, (a), pe 279, 1. 12-p. 280, |. 17 ad TA 4.251ed (nanyasastrasamuddistarh srotasy wktart nije caret «He should not do within [the practice of] his own scripture anything that has been taught in another’): apelin plinar utparinaydnSastrantaradapeksantyam. anyathd ki tataditikartaoyatalalapasyépariprtik ‘iat. a0 Hi SFipdroadastre “tatra dodrapatin isto mahdstrenabkimantritam \ pusparsviniksiped dhyato oad vighnaprastntaye” ityddau dodrapatinar kathar gtr ity apeksdyant samanatantrdechrtriirbhaireat “tto male utarato nandirudrars ca jahnavine\ mahokilahsadarkstrarh ca yamunaiecaivadaksine” iytdy pesantyam. arava cx jealt puspark kathamh viiksiped ity apekzdylrhsanidnatante tatksepasya supastam anabhidhinat samanakalpa chrisouechandaststrat “Dhairzstrarh samucedrya pugparh sakgrhya bhavita | saptabhimantritam krtoa joaladagnisikhakulame | nardcstraprayogena praviged gphamadiyatah” ityady aplganiya,naracstrasya ea prayoguh Kr ity apelgayt samdnakalpe ‘pi sastretadanupalambhtd atyontae asamanad anantavijayakhyat siddhantaststrad “uttanark tu kararh krtod tisro ‘Agulyah prasdrayet rmadiyamaigusthakau lagnau cAlayeta muhur muhul | ndrdcak Krtito hy evan” ityady apeksontyam ‘But {one’s scripture] may lack certain necessary information. In that case one is bound to draw upon some other scripture, for otherwise it would be impossible to complete the full range of one's various obligations. To explain, the Paroaidstra [Mlinfijayottara] says: “Having worshipped the Door-Guardians there he should empower a flower by reciting the Great Weapon [inantra upon it] and after visualizing it buming he should cast it [into the shrine] to drive out [all] the impeders [that are in it)” (8.16). This and other [passages ofthe text] leave us in ignorance of how this worship [ofthe Door Guardians] is to proceed. So we are obliged to supplement {our information] with such passages as the following from the Trisrobhairava that being a text of the same kind (samdnatantrat): “Then atthe base [of the A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 113 > sarotinaas sarvgatam mahtmaytopatanam 21 eva st paeadht deo glite draeyardpint and (10) JY Sata 4 f 230056 (Mahalaksmyadisiddhipatale, vv. 34-38): brthmarai clpdnena Ksatriyhrs co Sivambund wilyttscandanapanena Sidran vai vigoabhesmand | striyovirangasamsparstd dtkgayeta sumadhyome. ‘The identity of two of the five jewels or ambrosias, semen and menstrual blood, is unproblematic since they are named uncryptcaly, the first in passages 1-2, 6, and 9 (reah,sukram) and the second in 1 (puspam), 3 yonipuspan), and 7 (raja). The mixture of the two, gathered after sexual intercourse, is termed kundagolam, as here in passage 5. This is the “flower” (kuswmam) that Abhinavagupta identifies as consisting of the ejaculations of both sexual partners. That the remaining three should include urine and excrement is obvious enough, since all five jewels are products of the body (passage 2), and the natural surmise that of these sidmbu ‘the water that is Siva’ is urine is confirmed by passage 8 [Abhinavagupta’s interpretation of Dharsodima as “the water that is Bhairava”(bhairaatma... emu) creates a synonymous expression. That excrement is intended by “the ash that i left from the burning ofthe fuel that is the world” found by Abhinavagupta in the term brahma is suggested by the fat that the digestive process that separates food into the nutrient liquid and waste was conceptualized as a process of burning in an intestinal fire (jafhardgnit); and it is confirmed by use of the expressions brahma and vigoabhasma in this sense in passages 6 and 10. Cf. 4's report that excrement (vara) is refered to as "Brahma or the brahmin.” I identify Abhinavagupta's “coagulation of the liquids found in all the serse-organs” with phlegm, because that description fits well with the lst ofthe five jewels or ambrosas, termed nalijyam “the butter in the tube” in the esoteric jargon. That this is the latter's meaning follows from passage 6, in which itis identified under its ordinary name (Ses), and fom passage 9, whichis surly referzing to it when it speaks ofthe "butter (djyam) that flows from the uvula (ghariacobrarutam)." Passage 4 implies the same identification when, commenting esoterially on raagam it says + + aml kanthakpe ca na tu Slepman tw haret “He should consume nectar inthis pit of his throat not phlegm.’ ‘These offering substances are to be placed in a bowl of alcoholic liquor (simamrlam: see passage 7) ‘Thus in passage 5: ‘The mantra master should flood excrement, urine, mingled semen and menstrual blood, and phlegm with wine, fill [a chalice made from) a human skull (nardkam) [with them] after ‘empowering it with the mantras [ofthe Yaga], and then drink [this mixture ofthe] five nectas and ‘wine (con.)" TA 29.10: atra yage ca yad draoyarh nisdahar Sastasartatau | tad eva yojayed dhindn ‘inamrtapariplutam: ‘In this worship the learned should employ precisely those substances that are outlawed in all the [Brahmanical] scriptures, flooding them first with alcoholic liquor’ and the commentary onthe Old Kashmiri Makinayapralatap, 139, I, 10-13, in which the worshipper is instructed to worship the deities of the Krama in a chalice filled with wine and smeared with the two jewels, probably semen and menstrual blood: pare... rainadonyalabdhanyastapardszvapajitarghabharite Ki). Wine and the jewels were also to be used in initiation, where they were known as caruleera, a term that in the exoteric context refers to ice, barley, and pulse boiled with butter and milk on fie taken fom the Homa fire and fed to the candidates during initiation, The Trivandrum Mahdnayapratasa gives “tasting the caru” (carupragenam) as the action that bestows initiation in the Krama (2.Sbed) arupraana‘paroakam (em. : caruprisanaparoakah Ed.) | gurund sarkpradayasya bhajanar kiya paswh The gru makes «bound sol ino a rceplaceof th ation by giving him the cs foo; and this is mentioned as an alternative method of initiation in the Kaula Trika in TA 29.1986-9: cro ca od gurur dadyad vamamptapariplutan | nissrkam grahande chaktigotro mayojito Bhavt ‘Or the guru may simply give the [candidate] caru flooded with wine. If [the candidate} accepts it without inhibition he will enter the clan of the Goddess and be free of Maya.’ See Jayaratha’s comment on this verse (passage 2: The caru is such as the five jewels, in accordance withthe following passage of scripture: “shall teach you the caru within the body that is hard to attain even for the gods: urine, semen, [menstrual] blood, phlegm, and excrement. Therefore [the guru] with due rites should give [the candidate this] card in the body to consume”. Similarly in passage 10, inthe Krama-telated th Sata ofthe Jaydrathaydmala (on the Kashmirian provenance of Satkas 2-4 see Sanderson 2005b, pp. 40-43): >14 Samarasya external observance into a purely cognitive process of sudden enlightenment (Virdvaltkula),* the convergence of the triads of the Trika into the goddess Kalasarhkarsini (Devyaytmala),® and the accompanying superimposition of the categories of the tetradic Krama (Trikasadbhava).! Since all these features, which are diagnostic of Abhinavagupta’s Saivism, are lacking in the Malinteijayottara, one may ask why he chose to make it his base-text. Any of the texts just mentioned would appear to have had a better claim; and the Virdoalikula the best claim of all, since sources recognized and quoted by Abhinavagupta place the teaching of that Tantra at the very summit of the Trika’s hierarchy of practice, and locate the Malintvijayottara well below it as the basis of the most elementary level of the system.” However, I propose that it was precisely because of this seemingly non-ultimate character that Abhinavagupta made the Malinfvijayottara the basis of his Paddhati. For what characterizes it is not merely its lack of the higher doctrines and devotion to Kalasarikarsint that constitute the core of Abhinavagupta’s Trika — these can be read in as implicit if the Malinfoijayottara is the all-encompassing revelation — but also the presence of elements which align it in the other direction with the Siddhantatantras, notably its system of the seven levels of conscious beings (sapta pramatirah) and its gradualist system of meditation (yogah)." In these respects the text has a distinctly Saiddhantika tone; and indeed, unlike the higher, Kaula and Krama-influenced scriptures, of the Trika, it is cited by Saiddhantika authors in the exegesis of their own scriptures.” > O hairwwaisted one, [the gurs] should initiate brahmanas by giving them alcoholic liquor to drink, ‘gatriyas by giving them urine, valyas by giving them semen, Sidras by giving them excrement, and women by contact with the body of a male adept.’ See TA 489-91; 15.108e-109b; 29. 177-186b; 29.285; 29.271-277 See TA 370; 15.3356; 3196-100, See Sanderson 1980, pp. 5861. See Sanderson 1986, pp. 1978 67. See TA 13:300c-302 with TA 2240-42 and the unattributed quotation in TAV ad 13302. 68, See TAV vol. 7 (10), p.7,L 17-p. 8,1. 2, stating an objection to reference to this hierarchy of agents of consciousness in an exposition of the Trika: nano asmaddarsane narasivasakyatmatam: eva vigoam iti saratrodghosyte, tat katham ih sidahintadardanddisamucitae pramatrbhedam:avalamtbyaiad uktam ‘Surely itis declared in ll [sources] that it isthe Individual, Siva, and his Power that constitute the universe in our system, So how is it that he has made this statement, adopting the plurality of agents of consciousness proper to the doctrine of the Siddhanta and the like?’ The Malinzjoyottara teaches its system of meditation on the reality-levels in 12.20-16.68. Abhinavagupta takes such gradualist meditation to be characteristic ofthe lower Tantras in MVV 1.198c-196b, quoted and translated above (0.95. 69, See Mygendraoyti, Vidyapada pp. 117 (31) and 123 (260ab); Mrgendraorti, Yogopida pp. 10 (17.18abe) and 35 (22-4e); Mrgendraorti, Kridpada p. 48 (727-29) and 176 (1129-326); Kirnzortti on 1.22¢-23 (0.1819); and Matehgapirametcarsetti, Vidysptda pp. 106 Ul. 35 (118-19); and p. 108, Ie 13-14 (2.60ab). There is also evidence that Sadyojyotis knew the text; see Ibe of his Motsckarit on the Reuravasatrasarigraha (<— MVUT 1.17¢-18a); 2 (€— MVUT 1.25d); and cf. 73 with MVUT 1.1819. Finaly,a text quoted without attribution in his Sozyambhuoaort (p. 73, 8-9 “yo hi yas gunotisoh se tsmad ardkoam" it) is identical with 2.60ab: yo hi yasmad gunotksta sa tasmad "ardhoom iyate (em, following [i] Mrgendraorti, Vidyptda p. 123,14 [Kashmir and Devakottai eds i] TAV vol. 5 (8p. > RAEA Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 15 It appears, then, that the Malintvijayottara was the ideal matrix for an exposition of the Trika that aspired to encapsulate Tantric Saivism as a whole, because it could be felt to subsume not only the highest texts such as the Virdvaltkula, with their transcendence of rites and grades, but also the religion of the lower levels. And this catholicity could be seen as the translation into practice of the ‘higher non-dualism’ (paramadoayadystih) which Abhinavagupta promotes as the ultimate truth, that is to say, a non-dualism which does not simply transcend dualities but includes them. In this perspective we might say that the Virdualikula is limited by the fact that its non-dualism is experienced negatively as the transcendence of all that flows, both reality and texts, from the ultimate consciousness it embodies, whereas the Malintvijayottara transcends this intolerance of the forms of Saivism that are not pre-eminently cognitive, non-dualistic, and subitist, to accommodate all forms of the religion, to become, as Abhinavagupta describes the metaphysical teaching of the Malintvijayottara, the universal system that tolerates or favours all Saiva systems.” He finds this view of the greater religion in the following passage of the Malintuijayottara’s 18th chapter:” natra Suddhir na caSuddhir na bhaksyadivicaranam | na doaitart ndpi cadvaitarn lirigapajadikarit na ca N74 1 na capi tatparityago nisparigrahatapi va \ saparigrahata vdpi jatabhasmadisarigrahah 75 tattyago na vratadinarh cardcaranarh ca yat | ksetradisarpravesas ca samayadiprapalanam N76 \ parasvarapalingadi namagotradikat ca yat | nasmin vidhiyate kirtcin na cfpi pratisidhyate 77 vikitarh sarvam evatra pratisiddham athapi va | kirt to etad atra devesi niyamena vidhiyate 1178 \\ tattve cetah sthirtkaryam suprayatnena yogind | tac ca yasya yathaiva syat sa tathaiva samdcaret N79 W ‘79 suprayatnena Keo : suprasannena as quoted in TA 4.213c-2196 > 23,13, il the reading of the Kashmirian MSS and most Grantha MSS at Malaigepdramesvararti, Vidyapada p. 108, lL 14 : drdioa igyate Bhat [ibid] following two Grantha ms. : arden ueyate Keo, TA 9310ab, TAV vol 2, p. 311, 1 9). 70. See MVV 1.631: sarvanugrihakamt paksam dllambisase yadi | paramadoayadrstih tat sorsrayeh Saranart ‘ahat ‘lf you wish to adopt the point of view that favours all others, you should take on the doctrine of higher non-duality, the ultimate refuge’ 1.693: asmims tu pakse sarvesarh pravadand api sthith\ yuktt saroarsahe pase na knit ila dusyati “In tis postion it s reasonable that all doctrines should have their place. In the position that tolerates all [positions] nothing is false’ 21d: paradoaitart ya visougrthakrh “The higher non-duality that favours all.’ Cf. MVV 1.133: tatah pargataya sarvartsahabhaiavadhimani | piicimako ‘yar Ststrartha SAmbhacah ‘So this fivefold Saivism is located within the light of Bhairava, ‘who, since he is all-encompassing, is all-accepting” 71, Malintijyottara 1874-79 (quoted in TA 4.213c-219b).16 Samarasya In [the practice of] this [Tantra] there is neither [Veda-congruent] purity not its absence; no concern for what may [or may not] be eaten (drunk, touched,] and so forth; neither dualistic observance nor its rejection; neither such [rituals] as liriga worship nor their abandonment; neither [the rule of] owning nothing nor its opposite; neither such [features] as the wearing of matted locks and [the smearing of the body with] ashes nor their rejection. The adopting or avoidance of ascetic observances and the like, the visiting of ksetras and other (sacred sites], the observance of post-initiatory disciplines and so forth, and [distinctions between] such [features as] one’s own and others’ icons, insignia, [initiation-]names, [initiation-Jlineages, and the like are neither enjoined nor prohibited in this [Tantra]. Everything [may be] enjoined or forbidden in [accordance with] this scripture. This alone is strictly ruled in it, O Empress of the Gods: that the meditator, striving with all his strength, should fix his awareness firmly on reality. He may adopt whatever form of practice enables him to achieve that. In the Tantraloka Abhinavagupta interprets this passage in just the spirit that I have proposed. He takes the Malinivijayottara to be propounding as its final position an enlightened Saiva consciousness which enjoys a perfect freedom of practice by embracing and transcending all the Saiva systems, both those that prescribe specific disciplines and, finally, a subitist Saivism, which does not. By prescriptive Saivism Abhinavagupta takes the Malintoijayottara to mean both the exoteric or common (saminya-) Saivism of the Siddhantatantras and a lower Kaula form within the Trika itself, which, though it throws off many of the externals of exoteric Saivism, deploys its own limiting structures in their place. It follows that he took it to include by implication the various Saiva systems between these two, that is to say, the Vama and Daksina (Bhairava) systems and, most importantly, the Malinfvijayottara’s own non-Kaula form of Trika practice. The non- prescriptive Saivism that Abhinavagupta takes the Malintvijayottara to have in mind, is a Trika system beyond even the Kaula level, but an essentialized, internalized reflex of that level. When these two Kaula levels, with discipline and without, are distinguished the first is termed the Kula and the second the Kaula or, less confusingly, the Mata. It is to this non-prescriptive level that the Virdualikula belongs. It is, then, the highest Tantra only in a penultimate sense, being transcended in the ultimate by the doctrine of the Malintoijayottara, which transcends both the uncomprising transcendence of the non- prescriptive Mata and the compromises of Siva's consciousness represented by the various prescriptive systems from the lesser Kaula Trika to the gradualist Siddhanta. Thus, explaining the section of the passage that begins [Here there are] neither such [rituals] as Liga worship nor their abandonment” he writes: siddhante liigapajokta viSvadhvamayatavide | kulddisu nisiddhasau dehe vigvdtmatavide 1256 sha sarvatmake kasmat tadvidhipratisedhane | niyamdnupravesena tddatmyapratipattaye 257 IA Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 17 jatadi kaule tyago'sya sukhopayopadesatah | vratacarya ca mantrarthatadatmyapratipattaye 258 M tannisedhas tu mantrarthasarvatmyapratipattaye | ksetrapithopaptthesu pravego vighnasantaye 1259 mantradyaradhakasyatha tallabhayopadisyate | ksetradigamandbhavavidhis tu sodtmanas tathd 1260 1 vaigvarapyena parnatvart jfidtum ity api varnitam | samayacdrasadbhavah palyatvenopadisyate 261 \ bhedapranataya tattattyagat tattoavisuddhaye | samayidinisedhas tu matasastresu kathyate 1262 nirmaryadark svasatbodhart sariparnari buddhyatam iti | parakiyam idavi rijparn dhyeyam etat tu me nijam 1263 saladi lnigart canyasya kapaladi tu me nijam | adiSabdat tapascaryavelatithyadi kathyate 11264 1 nama Saktisivadyantam etasya mama ndnyatha | gotrart ca gurusaritano mathikakulasabditah 265 Srisaritatis tryambakakhya tadardhamardasaynjriita | ittham ardhacatasro ‘tra mathikah Savikare krame 1266 W yugakramena karmadyan minanta siddhasarttatih | disabdena ca gharari pallt pithopapithakam 267 mudra chummeti tesarh ca vidhanarh svaparasthitam | tadatmyapratipattyai hi svarh sarttanam samaSrayet 268 W thufijfta pajayec cakrarh parasarntanind na hi | tac ca matasastresu nisiddharh Khandand yatah 269 akhande ‘pi pare tattve bhedendnena jayate | evarh ksetrapravesadi sarhtananiyamantatah 1270 nasmin vidhtyate tad dhi saksan naupayikarh sive \ nna tasya ca nigedho yan na tat tattoasya khandanamt 1271 W vigvatmano hi nathasya svasmin rape vikalpitau | vidhir nisedho va Saktau na suarapasya khandane 11272 \\ paratattvapravese tu yam eva nikatarh yada | upayarh vetti sa grahyas tada tyajyo ‘tha va kva cit 273 W na yantranatra karyeti proktarh Sritrikasasane | samata sarvadevindm ovallimantravarnayoh \274 Agamanari gatinart ca sarvari Sivamayari yatah 11275 264a Siladi conj. : jodladi Keo 267a karmadyan conj. : kiirmadya Keo, supportedus n. % 74. Samarasya by TAV ad loc. 271¢ nisedho corr. : nigodho Keo 274¢ saroadevinam Keo's MS ka, TAY citing scripture ad loc. without attribution (samati sarvadevinavit varnanatt caiva saroasah) : saroadevdndrit Keo In the Siddhanta one is required to worship the liviga, with the intention that ‘one should come to see it as embodying the whole universe; but such [systems] as the Kaula forbid the liviga cult, so that one may [progress to] realize this universality in {the microcosm of] one’s own body.” [But] in this all-inclusive [teaching of the Trika] what reason could there be either for requiring the cult or for forbidding it?” [The lower Tantras prescribe the wearing of] matted locks, [ashes], and the like, so that by constantly adhering to these rules one may realize one’s identity [with Siva]. [But] the Kaula system forbids these [practices]; for it teaches a method that abjures all austerities.”* [The non- See, eg,, MVUT 18.2c-3b: mycchailadhaturatnadibhavart niga na pajayet/ysjed adhystmikar Ungar Tinirdghitana 12Sab: “liigart (core. Vasudeva: liga Cod.) *sondehe (core. Vasudeva: suedehesu Cod.) sartpajya TAV ad loc: tha punah paramadvayarape trikadarsane tadvidhind tannisedhena od na kiheit prayojanam ‘But in tis [system, that isto say, inthe] Teika system with is higher non-duality, no purpose would be served either by enjoining or by forbidding it’ See MVUT 18.74d-75: lngepnadtn na cx | na cap tatparitytgo Literally ‘an easy method.’ TAV ad loc: knul kuladarsone punar aya jaladibhasmades tage nizedho vita ‘ty arta, yd ubktam "atbhasmaicnnans ca dona ki vrata ila Ratotigum atyugrar drayed is tu Bhutale | na tasya sarigamart kuryat karmand manasa gira” iti, yato ‘tra visaydsange ‘pi plramesoarasvarapapatick sukhendyatnenopayasyopadesah, yad uktam “pirvair nirodkak kathito tuirdgyabhyasayopata | asmabhis tu niodho'yam ayztnenopaigyate” ‘He means tat in the Kula system (laladarsane < kaule) the prohibition (nisedhak ¢— tyapah) of matted locks, ashes, and the rest is enjoined, as taught lin the scripture] “He should not associate in act, thought or speech with anyone ho wears such insignia as matted locks and ashes, the banner, (the atributes of] the Kapalika observance, the trident and the terrible skull staff.” For in this [system] is.taught a method of realizing one's identity with Siva easily, without effort, even while one is immersed in {the enjoyment of] the objects ofthe senses, as taught in [Scubodkodayamatjartv, 12]: “The ancients taught cessation by means of the repeated practice of detachment. But I tach now that this cessation may come about effortlessly”! CCE. Kulasra tf, 62v-83e:Bhasma Linge jatar tajya tual Arid | sadaguplenaBhavenegaha- “goarasarsthitis (con. :gocasarsthit Cod); Kulspaneasita 3.17-21b (.4v3-5r) collated with ations (1) (8.19 quoted by Ksemaraja, Siasatravimarsiné ad 326 and Netratantrodéyote vol 1 p. 191; 20-216 Quoted without attribution by Jayaratha on the present passage [TAV vol. 3 (4), p. 287): yogavit ‘kulamargajfiak medhdot “kulapajakah (em. : kurupajakah Cod.) | deorbhaktah (em. : bhakta Cod.) suguptatma rarity abidhtyate | yady ap te trikes (em: ja Cod.) traiokytkarsane kama |tthipi savotdcrth pilayanti“kulonnatime (con :kulodbhat? Cod.) | aoyakaliiginam dsted ‘sambhasanti (cot. : sambhasonti Cod. : sombhigante T) martcaya | liginark nopaserpenti “atigupeayatah priye (cor. : atigupla yo priyet Cod. tguptatara yta 1) at und SM “bhasmt (Cod. : dandtT) mudedpanealabasitl (T: Busta Cod) wiratacarya*samopeto (corr. :samopetert Cod.) yas tu ‘sevat (core. : sevnti Cod.) maithunam | ‘irsponarato devi mama *éroh (1 dha Cod.) mahesar (x lace of 20-2 T has only two lines: ja bast Sikh dana parcamudrsvibhasita \pramadan maithunat ktod mama drohtmahesoari) ‘We call guru one ‘who is a master of Yoga, a knower of the Kaula path, a wise worshipper of the Kula, a devote ofthe Godiess, and completely concealed. Though [initiates] know the past, present, and future, though they can attract {any being] throughout the three worlds, yet they conceal their practice and 50 protect the status of the Kula When the Yoginis see one whose religious affiliation is hidden they >A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara ug 75 7%. Kaula Tantras prescribe] the practice of [imitative] ascetic observance as the ‘means of achieving identity with the [deity] denoted by [one’s] mantra.” But [the Kaula Tantras] forbid this practice of impersonation, so that one may [progress to] realize that the [deity] denoted by the mantra is all-embodying, [The lower Tantras, both non-Kaula and Kaula, prescribe] entering holy places such as the Fields (kgetram), Seats (pithah), and Secondary Seats (upapithah) as a means of overcoming obstacles [to the success of one’s practice], or, in the case of an initiate engaged in mastering a particular mantra or [vidya] (mantradyarddhakah (sadhakak}), as the means of achieving that [mastery]. [But elsewhere, in Mata texts,] one is forbidden to visit holy places; and the purpose of this prohibition is to encourage the realization that one’s self is embodied in everything and therefore all-embracing.” [In the same way, almost all Saiva scriptures, both Kaula and non-Kaula] require that one adhere to various rules [once one has been initiated]. But Mata texts (matasastrani) prohibit this, saying “One should realize one’s own consciousness / (nirmaryada-) and all-containing,” intending to promote the realization of {non-dual] reality, on the basis that rules are dualistic by nature because they entail the exclusion of all kinds [of other actions]. (Likewise, both ordinary Kaula and non-Kaula Saiva initiates] distinguish between different icons, seeing one as their own and others as alien, and between insignia, seeing such {insignia] as the trident (Saladi [em.]) as those of others and those such as the speak with him. They do no approach one who displays the external marks {of his religion, for they ae extremely secret, O beloved. One who has sexual intercourse and enjoys the drink of (Kaula] heroes assaults me, © Goddess Mahesvart, [if he does this) while engaged in the practice of ascetic cbservance, with matted locks, shaven head, [or celibate’ hartut, [smeared] with ashes, and adored With the five insignia [of the Mahaveata, namely, the necklace, earrings, bracelets, and topknotjewel of human bone, and the Brahmanical thread of human hair] For the five insignia, ie. the six minus ashes smeared on the body, see the following verse cited by Yamundctrya, Agamapramanye, pp. 46-47 (1), edited here by collation with the closely related verse cited by Nirmalamani as cited in Somuamthupadahati vol. 3, p. 681, n. 7 (NY: mth (em. : kart Y Aandi N) nda cai aca (= wragarh N) ox "Sekar (N Sima Y) | bhasma (Y ea N) ope cx “mudedsathar racasate (V: mudd ele mahtoraith N) "They teach thatthe sx signs are (2) the necklace, (2) the earrings, (3) the bracelets, (4) the hairjewel, (8) ashes, and (6) the sacred thread {made from human hai’ These six minus the ashes, are defined, but not numbered, in [Y Sati 1 f 139113, in the order earrings, bracelets, hairjewel, sacred thread of human hair, and necklace: ordnait nypasardala tante ‘sin Bhairaodrcte | Subhrasankhe (1) prakertaoye doyarigule karnike éubhe\*rucake (em. : caruke Cod) (2) doyeiguleSaseturybigusthasitkimanih (2) triernaraiactpannastripatcasarish (§) sama | kanthaj (core. : jah Cod)ghanasarsparst Sestak parcavato ‘pica | suorttamentsarigha"ta(cort ‘ah cod.samghatauval (5) sama dhdrystdhakacandrena Segabhata tadiccha'yl (em. : gd Cod) The consecrated mantra-propitiator (mantrdrddhalah) takes on the appearance of the mantra-dety while seeking mastery over it. Thus one who propitiates Kali dresses in women’s clothing; se, eg. Kitalapaficasetalf, 58 (6SAabe): paroad arabhya sroas ith pajayed yoginandana | sirtrgadhir today; Ormikularava f 1604: strtoeqadharalo Batted pajtkarmadyato guru TAV ad loc., quoting without attribution: natal Kvicd apasyart prakseptevyart ca naa ktcid opi | parparnesaty atmani kik nu ksetrdiparyatanaih ‘Nothing can be substracted from it and nothing can be added to it Since the self is all-containing what isthe point of pilgrimages to Fields and the rest”120 Stmarasya skull-bow] as their own.” And when the Malinfoijayottara adds that there are yet other things that set one apart (adisabdat) it has in mind such matters as penances, times of practice, and the lunar days fon which special worship is required, all of which are determined by the nature of the system one is following]. [And then there are initiatory names. For example, Kaulas think:] “This [person is a Saiddhantika and so] has an initiation name that ends in -Sakti, -siva or [-gana] [according to gender and caste], whereas I do not [but am identified] otherwise, [by a name chosen without reference to such distinctions).’* “The clan’ (gotram) [of which the Malintvijayottara speaks) is [a person's] teaching lineage, also known as his ‘order’ (mathika) or ‘descent’ (kulam). In the Saiva tradition there are three and a half such ‘orders’: the Srisarhtana, the Traiyambaka [saritana], the Half-Traiyambaka(sarhtana], and the Amardaka[samtana].” (In the Kaula Half-Traiyambaka order] there is 7. 78 have rejected Keo's reading julad ‘such [insignia] as the flame’ because there is no evidence that ‘a flame’ was ever a Saiva insignium and because itis in any case implausible that it would have been, since the insignia in question are attributes carried by ascetics that enable those who see them to identify the tradition to which they belong. Male initiates in the Siddhanta are given names ending in -siva if they are born into one ofthe three regenerable caste-classes (bréhmana, ksatriya, and vaisya) and ending in -gana if they are born sadras. All female initiates have names ending in Sakti: see TAV ad loc. and Mrgexda, Kriya 860c- 61. Names in -Sva (/-Sambhu) are frequently encountered, since they are given to brahmanas, who dominated the authorship of texts and the positions that attracted the pious donations mentioned in inscriptions. For an example of a group of Saiddhantikas with initiation-names in -fva see the more than 95 images of named Sivacdryas in Darasuram (Hernault 1987, pp. 20-21, 3-35) from the twelfth ‘century. The first part ofthe names is that of one of the deities inthe retinue of Sadasiva in the worship of the Siddhanta, ie. the five face-Brahmas (Isana-, Aghora-, etc), the six Subsidiaries (Netra, Astra-, Sika, etc), the eight Vidyesvaras (Suksma-, Ananta-, ete) or the four positive qualities of mind (budahidharmaj) (Dharma-, Vairdgya-, JRana-, Aigvarya-). As for the Mantrapitha division of the Bhairavatantras, the Soacchandatana, its principal scripture, gives no, information on the names to be given to those initiated into its Mandala. Kgemarsja, however, comments (SOTU vol. 2 {4 p. 25 I. - 5) that they should end in iva or Sakti according to gender. So the names should mark gender but not caste. But the Kalditsdpaddhat, the Kashmirian guide to initiation based on this Tantra completed by Manodaguru in ap 1335/6 and subsequently enlarged, has regressed to the Saiddhantika position, for it requires that Sadra men should be differentiated; see f. 7778: Sudravsaye amulagonah ‘in the case of a Sada [man the initiating guru should declare "N-gana . ..”.” According to the Picumat, the principal YAmala- among the Bhairavatantras, men's names should end in -bhairava and women’s names in Sakti (f. 1714. £1721): Bairave tu yada pugparh palate... sacchandabhairaco nda td tasya prajayate | bairaoyar tu yada patak Sakibhaiaoasanjakoh; f. 17rd maria tu yada pasties eesu jdyate | tena gotrena tanndma Satisarjfah tadd bhave. In goddess-centred Bhairavatantas, such a the JW, all the inated, regardless of gender, should have names ending in Sak; see, og, Str 1, 1882b¢ (€ 11809-11941): puspapate kt sat Saktyantekapite nami (em. : dha’ Cod.) We are not told how cone should be named when initiated into the non-Kaula Trika of the Malintijayotara; but since this too is a Goddess-centred Bhairavatantra, one would expect names in Sakti, That is certainly what is prescribed in the Trika’s Tontrasadbhtos, Paala 8, f. 45v yasyt mantrasye pugpt dréyante pati tu tasya tatparoakarh néma Saktyantart peikalpayet. In the Trika’s Kaula system all names are gender- neutral and end in -bodhi, -prabhu, -yogin, ~inanda, -pada, or -avali, depending on the lineage (oval; see TA 29.36abe on Saiddhsntika intiation nam also Sanderson 2005a, pp. 38-59 (n. 179) For these orders see TA 36:1c-14: tada SritanthanathajivaSit sid avttaren 12 tryambakiardakiya- >‘A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 121 [also] the transmission of the Siddhas, one in each of the Ages, beginning with [Khagendra, the Siddha] before Karma (karmadyat [em.]) and ending with Macchanda.” In addition there are the [six Kaula] ‘hermitages’ (gharam) and ‘alms-houses’ (pallf-), the major and minor Seats of the Goddess (pithopapltha-), the hand-gestures (mudra) and lineage signs (chumma)." To use these is again to distinguish between self and other. [A Kaula initiate needs to understand these matters because] he must keep to his own order in > Srinatha advaye doaye | dvayadvaye ca nipunah kramena Sivagasane 13 adyasya ctnvayo jajne dvitiyo luhityiomat | sa cdrdhatryambakbhikhyah sarttnah supratgthtak 14 ata cardhacataro tra mathikth sarhtattraat sgyapraszyair vista Satasakham vyzvasthtai, ‘(Finally the teaching was transmitted through a line of excellent human meditation masters but it was eventually lost} Then three Siédhas took birth at the command of the Lord Srtkantha. These were Tryambaks, Amardaks, and Srinatha, and they were masters repectively of the non-dualistc, dualistic, and dualistic-cum-non-dualistic teachings of Siva. An additional line derived from the daughter ofthe fist. This was the welhestablshed lineage known as the Hal-Traiyambaka. Thus, through these lineages we have our three and a half orders, which have spread far and wide through pupils and pupils’ pupils in countless branches! In TA 3760-6 our author tells us that in the Traiyambaka order his teacher was Lakgmanagupta (preceded by Utpaladeva and Somananda), in the Kaula Half-Traiyambaka Sambhunatha (preceded by Sumati), in the Amardaka Vamanatha, and in the Srisarhtina ‘the son of BhGtirsja.’ In TA 36.15 he tells us that his Tantraota is imbued with the essence of the teaching of all of these orders. Somananda and Abhinavagupta tell us that the Traiyambaka was known as the Teramba in the vernacular; see Sivadrsti 7.121ed: tryambakakhya teramba deSabhasaya; IPVV vol. 3, p. 402, L. 17: truigambalathye lokaprasiddhya terambadhidhane (corr :tairimbabhidhane Keo) gurusaritane. CE. the ‘Aranipadra (Randd) Saiva monastery inscrition's description of four eazly (eighth-century) gurus of its lineage as presiding successively in Kadambaguha, Sankhamathika, Terambi, and Amardakatirtha respectively (ET 1: 40, IL 7-14), and the Ranipur Jharil Inscription’s reference to a guru Gaganativa originally of the Utaraterambaggha (EI 24: 32, Il, 1-2): utarateramagrhavinirggatagapanasiaabhidha [.. dcaryena. Tt seems likely thatthe Teramba order's connection with non-dualsm and the Trika was 4 secondary development within an originally Saiddhantika organization. The first Sata of the Jeyadrathayamaia gives.a Tairambha and Mahatairambbhika as the frst two among eight orders (math) proper to the Ssivas of the Southern (Daksina) Stream and an Uttaratairambha among ten proper to those of the Northern (Vama) Stream; see f. 187r7-8 (45.33cd): mathika cdtra tairambha mahdtairambhikapard; f. 189r9-v1 (45.90-91b): gambktra*mathika (corr. : madhika Cod.) . . .tathd cottara- “tirambha (cor. airimbha Cod.) Slmaltdatart sma, The Amardaka Matha is associated with the sage Durvisas as the origin of the Saiddhantika lineage traced by Aghoraéivacarya in his Gotrasartati found at the end of the Mahotseavidhi pp. 419 et seq. The sage Durvasas also figures in Somananda's account ofthe Teramba lineage (Sioudrst 7108-122). There Teyambakaditya, the fist guru isa son of Durvasas created mentally atthe command of Srtkantha to prevent the loss of the tradition. 80, Kes reading karmadya is suspect because Karmalnatha] is not the first of the Siddhas of the Ages (yugam), He is the second, the first being Khagendranatha; see TA 29.29¢; Kaltkulaparcagataka 3.6-7: hagendranatho vijamba samayatau krte yuge \ doittye karmanathas tu mangalambasamanvital | itive resenathas tu kimamargalaya soha\ caturthe minanathas tu korkanambdsamdyutak; the commentary on the Old Kashmiri Mahanayaprakasa p. 115, Il, 13-14: Srikhagendrakarma*mesa (cort. : Sesa Keo) racchandakhyaya catvarah siddha vyapadisyante; Arnasisiha, Mahdnayaprakasa 183c: khagendradyah sidhaarah.Jayaratha sees the problem but resolves it by claiming that -2dya- ‘first’ ‘preceding’ in armaiyt is intended to be understood twice (lntrena), ie. as karmadytya ‘the frst of which (dy) is he who was before Karma (kirmadye-).’ Doubting this explanation as artificial I have conjectured sarmadyin ‘Tbeginning| from [the Siddha] who came before Karma.’ 81, For these sets of six see TA 29.3639 and the Kulakridavatara quoted by Jayaratha ad loc.122 Verse 8, 8 Samarasya order to achieve identity with [his deity]. He must never eat with a person from an order other than his own, or worship an assembly [of Kaula initiates and Yoginis] which includes such people. But [all] these [common Kaula] distinctions are rejected in [the higher Kaula] Mata texts on the grounds that they introduce dualities into [the initiate’s perception of] a reality that is truly undivided. [The Malintvijayottara transcends this dichotomy between the Mata texts and the rest by declaring that) none of this, from visiting holy places to lineage restrictions, is enjoined or prohibited at this (highest level of revelation]. It is not enjoined, because it is not in itself a guaranteed means of access to Siva; and it is not prohibited, because it can do nothing to diminish that reality. For whereas the Lord is all-encompassing, injunction and prohibition are merely differential constructions [freely manifested] within his nature. They cannot compromise that nature itself. If one desires to penetrate ultimate reality one has only to adopt whatever method one feels to be most conducive in a given circumstance; and one may abandon that method as one sees fit. There is no requirement here [that one follow a particular system]. This has been taught in the following passage of Trika scripture: “All goddesses, lineages (ovallf)/" mantras, scriptures and methods are equal. For all are Siva.” 3 Srisambhundthabhaskaracarananipataprabhapagatasaritkocam | abhinavaguptakrdambujam etad vicinuta mahesapajanahetok \ = TA 1.21 (1) 3b prabhapa OcKEDT: prabhava GK,B,BJY . sartkocam GB KeoT : sartkocanam PBB] In order to worship Mahesvara [you have only to] examine the heart of Abhinavagupta, this lotus whose petals were opened [forever] by the radiance [that touched it] when he prostrated at the feet of the sun, [his guru] Sambhunatha.® ‘These lineages denoted by the term ovaliovllit are the six Kaula orders (Ananda, Bodhi, Avali, Prablu, Pada, and Yogin) taught in TA 29.320-38, There we are told that Macchanda and his consort Kunkanémba (Konkanambé) had twelve sons, ‘the princes’ (ajaputrah), that six of these were celibate (Grdaretasah) and so disqualified forthe Kula, and that these six orders descended from the othe six and their consorts.Jayaratha ad loc. glosses oval as ‘stream of knowledge’ (oval jttnapandhtt). The related term otis used in the same sense in the Kaula literatures ofthe worship of Tripurasundari and Kubjka; see, eg, Jayaratha, Varsalesoaroatavivarana p. 14,1 5: or ovis, For the vernacular origin of these terms consider Hemacandra, Desihdmamala 1.16Ab; atl asios‘lf (autocommentary:) oa Khadgadqah pails cetioalt “a blemish in a sword” and “a line”; cf. bid. 1.151: oggilo tata oto apa sro ‘ogila- and oala- “a small stream”; cf. ibid 1.148b: ol laparoa ‘it “a family lineage”; cf. in NIA Marth ogo! ‘stream’; Lahnda 6l ‘hereditary custom Gujarat of and Marathi of ‘line’; Marathi ol, ol 'streamlet, gutter. For these NIA items see Turner 1966-71, s.v. eoagalati, aoaghara-, and al The manuscripts of the Tantrasara show two readings: (1) -prabhapageta-, adopted in Keo and also seen inthe occurence ofthis sme verse inthe Keo of TA, and (2) prathoagt. The second reading veA Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 1B SAMBHUNATHA In the opening and closing verses of all his major Saiva works Abhinavagupta acknowledges his gurus. But they are not the same gurus in each. Taking the works in the order in which they were composed we see that he acknowledges Sambhunatha, Bhatiraja, and Laksmanagupta in the Mdlintoijayavarttika," Mahesvara/ParameSvara in the Pardtrisikavivarana,® the first three and MaheSvara in > 84, 85. acceptable sense. We could translate: ‘whose petals were opened [forever] (-gatasarthocar) by the power (-rabhaoe) of his falling (-nipate-) atthe feet (-carapa-) ofthe sun (-bhisar), (hs guru] (Gambhunstha)’ I have preferred the frst reading because it adds to the force of the verse whereas the second does not, though the reference to radiance (the cause of the opening of the lotus) isnot strictly necessary, a8 we can see from a closely parallel expression used by this author in [PVV vol. 3, p. 405, v. 2ab, where he describes himself as ndndgurupravrapddanipatajtasartvitsaroruhavasanoesitar “beautfed by the expansion of the lotus of his awareness brought about by [his] falling at the fet of varius outstanding teachers.’ For there the expression of the cause of the expansion is left entirely to the power of suggestion, namely, that his teachers aze being compared to the sun, which causes the petals of the day-lotus to open when its rays fll upon i MV 1227, ; PIV p. 187 (Keo p. 2), the 4th of the introductory verses: jayaty anarghameahima viptiapasuoraih Sriman tdyaguruh Sambhur Srikanthah paramesoarah ‘Victorious is Paramesvara, the venerable primal guru Siva Srikantha [in human from], who, of incomparable greatness, has freed a multitude of bound souls from their bondage’ and p, 283 (Keo p. 278), the 18th of the concluding verse: paramefrah prapennaproddharanakrpaprayuktagurubdayah \Sriman devah Sambhur mam iyatiniyuktaods tattve ‘Paramesvara, the venerable Lord Siva himself employing the awareness of [that] guru in his compassionate desire to rescue his devotees, established me in this great reality {through initiation} ‘That ths Paramedvara and Mahesvara are one and the same is made probable by the similarity in phrasing between these two verses and that in which the latter is acknowledged with Bhatia inthe Tantaoka 1: jaya gurur eka eva Srirtantho Bc pathtal | tadgparamartir bhagaosin mahesoro bkatngjat «2 Victorious isthe one guru, the glorious Srikantha manifest on earth the venerable Mahesvara, his ‘emanation, and Bhatiraja (another].’ And the following remark by Jayaratha ad loc. supports this conclusion: mahefoura it yah srsartatyardhatraiyanbakakiyarathikaor guratayanendryatoktah prams it 16a iti ce yad aha: bhatparikadibhatyantah srimén siddhodayakramah \ bhattAdiparamesantah Srisantinodayakramal\ Sriman Bhat{adir Wana paramo ‘tha gurukramnak | trikarpas triartke me diya tardhayattttaram ‘Mahesvara is the person whom he has mentioned elsewhere as his guru in the lineages (mathika [see TA 4.265cd: gotrarh ca gurusaritdno mathikakulagabditah|) of the Srisarhtina (Geinathasattina) and the (Kaula-Trika) Hal-Traiyambaka under the names Paramesa and Ia: “May [my] threefold guru lineage fully expand my knowledge of the doctrine of the Trika: the glorious lineage of the venerable Siddhas from the Bhattariks to Bhoti[rajl, the lineage of the venerable Srsamtana from the Bhatia to Paramesa, and above them all the supreme sequence of gurus from the Bhatta to Isa”,’ From TA 37.60ed we can infer that this MaheSvara who taught Abhinavagupta in the Stinathasarhtina was the son of Bhatiraja: érinathasarhtatimahtmbaragharmakantih Sribhatirdjatanayah seaptrrastdah“{My] sun in the vast sky of the Srinathasashtana was the son of Bhatirja, who had rectved the favour [of intiation) from his father’ That this guru was an important figure in the ealy part of Abhinavagupta’s career is confirmed by the closing verses of the latter's commentary on the ‘Bhagacadgta, There he tells us that he wrote this work while he was a pupil of the son of Bhatia (Giagaradgnrthasarigraha, p. 186, wv. 16-2: viprak Sribhatrjas tadanu samabhavat tasya sdmur mata | {endnt serio tamasinipatah proddta bkanuneva 2 taccaranalamalasadhupo bhagevadgethasargraart ‘adhd \cbhinaoaguptak sadrjaloakakrtacodanteasatah ‘After him came Bhatirsja, He had a noble son >Samarasya the Tantraloka,§ Sambhunatha alone in the Tantrasara, and Laksmanagupta alone in his philosophical commentaries on the [svarapratyabhijfiakarika of Utpaladeva and its auto- commentary (-viorti).” These differences are not to be attributed to changes of allegiance over time. It is hardly probable that Abhinavagupta followed Sambhunatha in the period during which he composed the Malinfvijayavarttika, dropped him in favour of Mahesvara before writing the Pardtrisikavivarana, returned to him before writing the Tantrdloka and Tantrasara, and then dropped him again in favour of Laksmanagupta before writing his philosophical commentaries. The differences are rather because it was our author's practice to do > 87 8, ‘who like the sun rescued all these people sunk in darkness, A bee atthe lotuses of his fet [his pupil] ‘Abhinavagupta has composed [this] Bhagadvadgrtar?hasartgraha induced by the exhortations of the brahmana Lotaka.’ That ths is a very early work is apparent from its simple style, its narrow range of sources, and its author's modesty. TA 19-11, 23 16. Abhinavagupta also acknowledges his father Narasihagupta, populatly known as Cuukhala/Cukhalaka/Cukhulaka (PTV pp. 2845 [Keo p. 280], v.12 [Cukhalal; MVV 15 [Cukhalal: TA 1.12 [(Cukhulakal; TAV ad lc. [euulak it lkaprasidham asya nmntaram 3754 (Cukhalaka:cualatti jjne prasiddhas candrtoadatadhisano narasiihaguptah; IPVV vol. 3, p. 405, v-1 [Cukhulakal). But it appears that he was Abhinavagupta’s teacher only in the science of grammar (oydlarenam), with which he began his scholarly career before he moved on to Logic (pramanasstra, tarkststram), Hermeneutics (oakyasastram), Poetics (sthityatdstram), and finally the study of the Sava scriptures; see TA 37583; MVV 15; IPVV vol. 3, pp. 4056, w. 25. IPV vol. 1, p.3, v. ded: budaheabhinavagupto ‘hart Srimallaksmanaguptateh ‘I] having learned [the Pratyabhijfa] from the venerable Lakgmanagupta’; IPVV vol. 1, p. 1, v. 2c (Srimallatsmana- ‘guptadarsitapathah sripratyabhijavidhaw ‘[I] who was guided on the path of the Pratyabhija by the venerable Laksmanagupta’; vol. 3, p. 406, v. Sed: sridastrakrdphattalakemanaguplapadesatyopadarsta- Siotdoayavadadrptak ‘proud master of the doctrine of Sivadvaya truly taught to me by the venerable Laksmanagupta, who was the product of [Utpaladeva], the author of {this} glorious Sastra’ That the Pardiriiktvivarana was written before the TantrAloka is shown by TA 9.313. There Abhinavagupta says that he has explained at length his assertion that each reality-level contains all those above it in his treatise on the Anuttara (eruttararakriyiyi), that i to say, in his treatise on the Parasia, For Anuttara in this sense see, eg, PTV p. 282 (Kao p. 276), 1. 26; MVY 1.917 (Euttaro gal); MVV 1.1120b (anuttaro maya). The work to which he refers is his Partrikvivarana and the passage in question is PTV p. 231, | 28-p. 23, l 13 (Keo pp. 137-43). The priority ofthe Patrstvnarana is also indicated by the fact that Abhinavagupta reports in that work that he writes forthe benefit of his disciple Karna (p. 254, vv. 7-10 [Keo pp. 279-80), who, with Mandra, also requested the ‘Matinejayavarttika (1.11), whereas in the Tantrtloka he tells us (TA 37.65) that Karna is dead, The Matinjayavartita too was writen before the Tentraloka since the latter refers to the former's account of the Saiva canon at 37.30 (mayaitat srotasrk rapam anuttarapadad dhrwodt\ arabhya vistarenoktam ‘malinotavartite) That the Malintijnaodrtita was written before the Partrisikvivarana is very strongly indicated by Abhinavagupla’s statement in the latter (p. 198 [Keo p.36, 1. 10) that he has already expounded at length in another work the subject of the state of absolute potental'snoncrcumsciption by past and future’ (klobhaytpariccadat). For this topic is treated at length in Malintjayaarti, 1.52- 188 and nowhere else in his surviving works That the Pratyabhijaa works were written after the exegesis of the Malintoijayotarais established by a citation from the Tantrasira in IPVV vol. 2, p. 203, I. 14-18 and by a reference to works ‘such asthe Tantrtloks and Tantasira in IPV vol. 2, p. 214, 1.A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 125 ‘homage only to the teacher or teachers who had contributed directly to his understanding of the subject-matter of the work in question. Thus just as Laksmanagupta was his sole source of instruction in the philosophical works of Utpaladeva, or the only teacher whose contribution to his understanding of them was direct or substantial enough to merit acknowledgement — he was, after all, Utpaladeva’s pupil and successor in the lineage of the Traiyambaka order —, so it would seem from his special position in the Pardtrisitavivarana that MaheSvara was his sole teacher in the case of the Parftrisika and the Anuttara form of the Trika based upon it And if all four of the teachers mentioned here (MaheSvara, Bhatiraja, Laksmanagupta, and Sambhunatha) are acknowledged by Abhinavagupta in the Tantrdloka, that is because each did indeed contribute to the work's contents, as more specific acknowledgements show in its course. However, they did not contribute in equal measure. The least important of the four appears to have been MaheSvara. He is cited only once as the source of a particular teaching, and his accommodation in the opening verses is correspondingly unemphatic.” Next in importance was probably Bhitiraja. A guru in the lineage of the Krama that had descended from the YoginI Mangala through JAananetranatha, he initiated Abhinavagupta’s father and Abhinavagupta himself in that system.” He may have 89. On the Anuttara form of the Trika, otherwise known as the Ekavira or Parakrama, see Sanderson 1960, pp. 80-83. 90. In TA 390 Abhinavagupta identifies his teacher Mahesvara as the source of his explanation of the dynamics ofthe eycle of the Sanskrit sylabary (matpkzcekram). 91, That he was a Krama master and the teacher of Abhinavagupta in this tradition is reported by an unidentified author on the lineages of the Krama quoted by Jayaratha as his contemporary (adatonah + yadubtant) (TAV vol. 3 [4], p. 193, I. 13-14): sibhatirgjanamapy dearyas cokrabhanusisyo ‘nya | sthinseaguptasya guror yasya hi kdlinaye gurutd ‘And there was another pupil of Cakrabhanu, called Bhatirja, who was the teacher ofthe teacher Abhinavagupta in the Kali system.’ There is also the evidence of a line in a verse from a lost work by Abhinavagupta quoted by Jayaratha in his comment ‘on the opening verse of the Tantraloka that acknowledges Bhutiraja (TAV vol. 1 [1] p. 29, 13 [on TA 1.9): batfarikadbiatyantah Srtman siddhodeyakramh ‘the glorious lineage of the venerable Siddhas fom the Bhaftarika to Bhatiraja]’ The Bhatyriks here is surely the Yogini Mafgala, the source of the rama lineage that passed from her to JRananetranatha, since in the Kashmirian literature no Saiva tradition other than the Krama is said to have originated from a woman. And in the Tantrastra Abhinavagupta quotes an unidentified work by ‘the venerable guru Bhatisja’ or ‘the venerable gun of Bhutrija’ (Le. Cakrabhanu) (Sribhatrajaguraoat), whichis evidently a work of the Keama since it 5 a metaphysical semantic analysis of the name Kal (p. 30, Il. 15-17: kgeptj jAdnde ca kalt Inlanastatayatha it 'as [my] venerable guru (or ‘asthe venerable guru of’) Bhatirja ha suid: “Also she is [called] Katt by virtue of her derivation from] kal, because she projects [Dhatupath 9.6849: fala vile igepe] and knows [Dhatupatha 9.322: kala gata sarikhyane cal"); see also the quotation from ‘Bhatirja on the nature of the goddess in Maharthamaijarparimala p. 122, 1 23. From Bhotirdja’s guru Cakrabhanu the lineage goes back through Hirasvanatha (/Vimana) and the Rajat Keyaravad to Jnananetranatha, also called Sivananda, who is said to have received the revelation from the Yogint Mangala in Uddiyana; see Amasithha, Mahinayaprakaa 154-157 (edited in Sanderson 2001, p. 15, n, 14); and the commentary on 9.5 of the Old Kashmiri Mahdnayaprakasa (Harasiru ina gaigi >126 Samarasya included Bhatiraja's instruction in this domain among the grounds for his acknowledgement. But this is not apparent from the Tanérdloka itself. When Abhinavagupta acknowledges him in the course of the work it is not in Krama contexts but for teaching him the Saiddhantika brahmavidya, a text interspersed with mantras that is to be recited in the ear of the dying” and a set of three Vidya formulas for use in a radically simplified form of Kaula initiation and for recitation by initiates thereafter as > contarana et jamu maigala pthadistna | st manzonuphatristhanallarana | bhinuptda asanaSigytna 'As the Ganges descends to earth from the head of Siva, so do al [the lineages of] the cardinal points of the Puta {Uddiyana] from Mangala. She was the friction-wood [that awakened the fire] ofthe three- staged Human Lineage [and] the venerable [Cakza]bhans [who followed the last ofthese three] was Dp tat he eigh Disciplsl srmanguave phd svetraptram yt hares seared tc siddhaugharapa *manavaughe netrardjathrascanatheti (em. : mangoaughanetrarajA hrasvandtheti Keo) *trirapasya kulsye oaliviesasyarons (co: trrapasya kulaay klasya ocliisesasytranis Ko) tray agntnam eotpattisthanarn tats ca maveughasyanteSisyaughigrantrBhanupadah asd Sigg prabur armadhyad “asad (con), cf. Amasimha, Mahdnayaprataés 158 on this female guru asa disciple of Cakrabhanu: Srimadianitakhya ya paicamudrévibhasita | akramakramasahttnakovdanh tt namémy shor: rajisanathya Keo) *madartaparamparyanidanam (core. : madantah paramparyanidanam core. KeD: sudantarporamparyanidanam Keo's mss) ‘Tt was Mangala who was the source from which the (lineages of the] cardinal points of the Pitha [Uddiyana] descended, as the head of Siva is [the source] of the Ganges. And she, [on her own] constituting the Siddha Lineage, was the friction-wood for the oustanding stream [of knowledge], the threefold descent consisting of [JAinalnetra,[Keydravat] Réjts, and Hrasvandtha, that constitutes the Human Lineage, a [the friction wood] isthe source of the three [Sratita] fires, Then at the end of the Human Lineage came the venerable (CakraJbhanu, the first of the Lineage of Disciples. He was the master of eight disciples. Among these was the Raj called Isic, the source of the lineage that ends [at present] in myself” ‘The title ‘Rajni (‘queen’), which we see here attached to the names ofthe female gurus Keydravat and Isan, isnot tobe understood literally It is more probable that it was curent in Kashmir as aterm fora female Sakta. The Kashmiri derivative ron* was used in this sense by the fourteenthcentury Saiva Yogint Lalla (Lal Dad): wot rainy argu sathar| athe al-pal wakhur hth (Gregson and Barnett 1920, p. 32) ‘Arise, O Rajat (rainy), and set out to make your worship, carying wine, flesh and cakes in your hands.’ In the second half ofthe eighteenth century the Kashmiian Bhiskarakantha renders the vocative rainy inthis verse with the Sanskrit Saktizsri‘O Sakta woman’ (loc. ct: lta stilt tah pajayetarh suradbhik ‘Arise, O Sakta woman, [and] worship Siva with wine and the rest’). In the same century Mangala herself is termed Rajat by Sivopadhyaya ad Vijtanabhairaoa 77 (p. 68, l. 13): saroa'manigald (con + marigala Keo) mangala raj bhagaoat ‘The evidence that Bhatirja was the initiator of Cukhulaka, the father of our author, is IPVV vol. 3, p. 405, v. 1: .. cukulakah sivamarganigthah | sribhatirdjzvadanoditasambhusestratattoansusatita- samastablandhakirah *.. Cukhuluka, devoted to the path of Siva, the darkness of whose existence in bondage was completely dispelled by the rays ofthe essence ofthe teachings of Siva that arose from the lips of Bhatirja, 92. See TA 31.626-91b, 31.62c-64b: athocyate brakmavidya sadyahpratyayadiyint | sivak Sribkatrajo yam asmabiyar pratyapadayat | sarvesam eva bhatandri marane samupasthite | yaya pathitayotramy jo yt rinaijnam ‘Next I shall tel you the brahmaviya that grants immediate evidence (ofits efficacy, (the brakmavidya that Siva [incarnate as] Bhatirdja has taught me. If it is rected when any creature dies its soul ascends [from the body through the cranial aperture] and attains the pure [state of release)’ While giving the text, which comprises 12 verses in the Arys metze exhorting the soul to rise from level to level within the body, Abhinavagupta notes its variant readings seen in the Nikoasa and the ‘Mulutottara, both Saiddhantika scriptures.‘A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrastra 127 a substitute for external worship.® Though $akta in character, in that they invoke the Goddess,* nothing connects them specifically with the Krama. More probably they belong to the related tradition of the Srinathasarhtana associated by Abhinavagupta with Bhatiraja’s son.* 93, 94 95, TTA 30,100-121b, See 30.120-121b: ett vidyttrayartSromadbhatntjo nyardpayat | yah stk abajac china chitaho manushi tanum “These theee Vidas were taught to me by the blessed Srikantha, who had sssumed human form in our midst as the venerable Bhatiraja' The Kaula character ofthe initiation is evident in the fact that before the three Vidyas are installed in the person of the initiand one installs ‘mantras that invoke Nathas among whom are Seinatha (in first place) and Macchanda. The formation ofthe mantras (TA 30.108ed), ie. HRIM SRIM + name + the honorific PADA, eg. HEIN SH SRINATHAPADA, 4s Kaula, as are the names mentioned, Srnatha is venerated in the Kaula Krama system as the Siddha ‘who revealed the scriptures; see Kallulapacatataka 2.128: vonde Srnathapadaba ‘I venerate the lotus- like feet of Srinatha; 5.86-87b: yasmae chrinathabhandare cintamanir iva sthita | may tathaiva aye ‘vidyegoptt hare ‘O Siva, Uhave concealed this great Vidya in my hear in this way, because itis, sit ‘were, the jewel that fufls all desices in the treasury of Srinatha’ and all the Patala colophons ofthe Kaladpareastaka and the Kramasadéhivn:... érnathatarite .. "in the ... brought tothe world by the venerable Sinatha’ In the Krama scripture Devtdoyardhasatikt he is worshipped at the head of the lineage of gurus (f,18v [226-227 tabrethe pjyed dei ka ktlakgayararim | oafukr ox ganddyasrh Srinthach Sabarim tatha | 227 anyaoh ca gurupaiktin ca paroam eva kramena tu. Macchanda (J Matsyendrandtha/Minatha) is venerated as the revealer of Kaulism in the current Kali Age in all ts systems; see, eg, TA L.7 and commentary; TA 19.32cd; KeliclapaAcasataka 3.6-7. The thre Vidyas following TAV ad 30.107-120b are: (1) OM HRM HOM sddhasadhani Sobdabramascartini samasttondhanikymtani bodhani Svasaabhtejanani SVAMA, (2) A UNO YA RA LA VA A NA PHEM mathtakefveri Isamasoa papantaktrini papari hana hana dhuma dhuna rudragaktvaéat °SAH (conj SAT Keo), HAM pare traloe ature yogadharin atme antaratme paramatme rudra*sake (core. :rudrakti Keo) rudradoite me pop daha daha saurmye sadasive 0M PHAT SVAHA We are told almost nothing about this order (mathikt,sarktanah) in our surviving literature, only (1) that it taught dualism-cum-non-dualism (bhedabhedah) rather than the dualism of the [Saiddhantka] ‘Amardaka order and the non-dualism of the (Trika’s] Traiyambaka (Teramba) order and the Kaula Hal-Traiyambaka order asociated with it (TA 36.11-13), and (2) that Abhinavagupta received instruction init from ‘the son of Bhatiraja, who had received the favour [of initiation] from his father (Grbhatrajatanayak soaptrprasadah)’ (TA 37.60cd). That the three Vidyss taught by Bhatirdja should have come from the Srinatha order fs well with Abbinavagupta’s report that his teacher in this order was Bhatirdja's son, who had received initiation from his father. But it does not follow from it. My suggestion rests rather on the following circumstances. Firstly, the frst of the Nathas installed in the ritual of initiation in which these Vidyas are required is Srinatha (TA 30.1023), which accords with the name ofthis order. Secondly, Abhinavagupta says when introducing this topic that he is going to explain Qathyate) the initiation (aitsa) which is Srisartatyagamodite ,..hatakeinaptaladhipacoaita (TA 30.101). Now, that could mean ‘Which has been proclaimed in the scripture Srisaitat, taught by Hitaketvara, the Lord of the Subterranean Paradises’ However, no such scripture is known. I prefer, therefore, to take éisartat- to refer to the Srinatha order, ie. ‘which has been proclaimed in the sctiptural tradition of the Srinatha order, taught by Hatakesvara, the Lord of the Subterranean Paradise the abbreviation srisamatih being attested elsewhere (TA 4.266; TAV ad 19 [see above, n. 85). We have seen evidence above that the Srinatha order followed a Sakta, Kaula tradition. As for the claim of Abhinavagupta that it professed a variety of dualism-cum-non-dualism, that isto say the View that the divine reality is one and many according to whether it is inthe state of resorption or emanation, we have no citations from that order's sources with which to test its accuracy. However, >128 Samarasya This leaves Laksmanagupta and Sambhunatha. As for the former, Utpaladeva's successor in the Traiyambaka order, we know that he wrote a commentary on the ‘Malintoijayottara® But it is unlikely that Abhinavagupta is acknowledging contributions to his understanding of problems in that Tantra when he mentions him in the opening verses of the Tantrdloka. For nowhere in the course of that work does he identify any such contribution.” It is much more probable that what he has in mind is his role as the teacher who expounded to him the philosophical writings of his guru Utpaladeva, Indeed in the closely related verses of acknowledgement in the Malinfvijayavdrttika, he makes clear, as he does not in the Tantraloka, that he is doing homage to Laksmanagupta only in this capacity, as his ‘teacher in the Pratyabhijna.”™ In that case one may object that if it was Abhinavagupta’s practice to acknowledge only those teachers who have clarified the work in hand, he ought not to have mentioned Laksmanagupta at all in these two works. But the objection is invalid, because Utpaladeva and Abhinavagupta, and no doubt Laksmanagupta between them, saw the Pratyabhijfa not asa discourse outside the Trika but as the systematic defence of philosophical principles revealed by Siva within its scriptures. Nor is this hermeneutical focus altogether invisible in those works. It is particularly evident in the following passage of the Isvara- pratyabhijfakarika (1.5.10-14): > the Kashmirian Bhatta Ramakantha (c. ao 950-1000) speaks of two kinds of Kaula non-dualism, one a doctrine of apparent transformation (oivariah) and the other a doctrine of real transformation (parinamah); see MataigaparameSoaranyt, Vidydpada p. 41, l. 1-4, translated in Sanderson 1992, pp. 307- 8, n.91 (for ‘merely transformation’ there read ‘merely apparent transformation’). It may be thatthe former represents the non-dualism of the Traiyambaka order (and the Kaula Hal-Traiyambala), the latter the dualism-cum-non-dualism (bhedabhedaadah) ascribed to the Srinatha, It may well be thatthe Krama too saw itself as teaching some such dualism-cum-non-dualism and that this was widely seen as the characteristic of Sakta emanationist systems. In this connection consider the unattributed verse on the Krama lineage quoted by Jayaratha in TAV vol. 3 (4) p. 195, I 5-8: ramakulcatustayraya- Uhedabhedopadesato nathah \saptadaiaiva Sisydn ittham cakre savartaniroaisan ‘Thus (fAdnanetralnatha initiated exactly seventeen disciples, some of whom had successors, some not, in the dualism-cum- ron-dualism that is based on the four states of embodiment in the [four] phases (ofthe cycle of Sakti” 96, See TAV vol. 11 (30), p. 184, U. 12-14 (on TA 30.16a), where Jayaratha tells us that Laksmanagupta interpreted dptait ‘fiery’ qualifying kyayaravalabjih ‘the seeds xsA, va, RA, vA, and tx’ as sarephak ‘with 1’ (i.e. ngts, ete). The reference isto his interpretation of Malnfijayottana 8.25¢ (TA 30. 16a). See also the next footnote. 97, Jayaratha claims that after stating Sambhunétha's view ofthe procedure forthe instalation of mantras taught in Matinnijayottara 821-49 in TA 15238-246 Abhinavagupta sets out Laksmanagupta’s view in 1547-252, See TAV wol. 9 (15), p. 1221.5: Sambhuntta iti SUkmanaguplamate hy anyatht ytscihir ity layah “His point in referring to Sambhunatha here is to convey that the procedure of installation is different in the view of Lakgmanagupta’ ibid, ll. 12-13 (introducing 15.247-8b) Srtakgmanagupiah punar etad anyathd vyacakhyao ity aha “But Laksmanagupta has explained this differently. So [abhinavagupta] says: .. .’ Peshaps this is correct. But Abhinavagupta makes no mention of Lakgmanagupta here 98. MUV 17 (TA 110), 18, 19-10 (—> TA LID). MVV 18bed: .. . pratyabhijopadesina Srimallaksmanaguptasya guror vijayate vacah ‘Supreme are the teachings of the venerable master Laksmanagupta, [my] teacher of the Pratyabhijna. .. .”‘A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 129 sodminas citmasaristhasya bhavajatasya bhdsanam | asty eva na vind tasmitd icchtmarsah pravartate 1110 1 soabhavam avabhasasya vimarsarn vidur anyatha | prakaso 'rthoparakto'pi sphatikadijadopamah W11 W ‘Aatmata eva caitanyart citkriyacitikartyta- | tatparyenoditas tena jadat sa hi vilaksanah 112 0 citih pratyavamarsatma pard vak svarasodita | svltantryam etan mukhyart tad aisvaryart paramatmanah 13 1 sf sphuratid mahdsatta deSakalavisesint | saisa sdrataya proktd hrdayarh paramesthinah l14 So it is indeed true that when the Lord manifests entities he is manifesting what already exists within himself. For [their becoming manifest requires that he be aware of them and desire manifestation; and] this consciousness of desire could not arise if they were not already within him. Those [who have mastered Siva’s teachings] know that the nature of any manifestation is representation (vimarSah). If it were not, then manifestation (prakasah), even if it could take on the colour of an object, would be indistinguishable from insentient [entities] like crystals. This is why one’s true identity (atma) has been defined as consciousness (caitanyam), that is to say, the act of awareness (citikriya), or [rather] the state of being the agent of that act. It is this that distinguishes one from the insentient. The act of awareness is [silent, internal] representation, speech all-containing, spontaneously active. It is the true autonomy. It is the power of one’s ultimate identity. It is this that is the ‘tremor’ [of consciousness] and the ‘absolute being’ which is unlimited as to place or time. It is this that is referred to as ‘the Essence (sdram); and this is ‘the Heart (hrdayam)’ of Paramesvara. Up to the words “It is the power of one’s ultimate identity” Utpaladeva speaks in this passage in terms which transcend association with particular Saiva scriptures. But thereafter he demonstrates the scriptural basis of his system by indicating that the power of representation (vimarsah, citikriya) to which he refers is known, though under other names, in the Saiva Tantras.” He does not tell us in his two commentaries exactly which 99. That Utpaladeva has the scriptures in mind when he says here that this power of representation (cimarsasaitt) is referred to as ‘the Essence (stram)’ and ‘the Heart (hrdayam)’ of Paramesvara is established by hs auto-commentaries se the Viti ad lo. (tata tatragame ‘in various scriptures’) and the Viet ad loc., which, to judge from Abhinavagupta’s -ioyivimarsins, referred to ‘scriptures and the like’ (Agamadigu); see IPVV vol. 2, p. 199, Il. 4-5: dgamesu paramesvaratdsenesu, adigrahanad vedinitdau, runipolesusiddhapronitesu gurunirapitegu ca Sstreu ‘In the scriptures, ie. in the teachings of Siva. By “and the like" he means in the Upanisads and the like, [and] in treatises proclaimed by sages, authored by Siddhas or taught by teachers’ Abhinavagupta takes him to be referring beyond the scriptural literature notably to the works of Kallata (Spandalaritt) and Somananda (Sivadrs)130 Stmarasya scriptures he has in mind; but Abhinavagupta is no doubt true to Utpaladeva’s intention when he cites the Trikasara for the term ‘essence’ (saram)."° For Abhinavagupta, then, the Pratyabhijiia expounds the philosophical basis of the ‘Malintoijayottara’s teachings, so that Laksmanagupta’s having trained him in that domain ‘was sufficient reason for his acknowledgement in the Tantraloka and Malintoijayavarttika, as well as in his commentaries on the Pratyabhijiia texts themselves. So it appears through elimination that none but Sambhunatha can be said to have taught Abhinavagupta the Trika of the Malinfvijayottara in the larger and more specific sense that accommodates the practical world of religion with its rituals, Yoga, and discipline; and this explains why he alone is acknowledged in the Tantrasara, since that is a shorter exposition concerned with essentials and fundamentals. Since Sambhunatha was Abhinavagupta’s only teacher in the Malintvijayottara it follows that his instruction embraced both the Kaula and the non-Kaula forms of the system; and this comprehensiveness is confirmed by the range of the many acknow- ledgements that occur in the course of the Tantraloka. Thus, when Abhinavagupta tells us that Sambhunatha was his guru in the Half-Traiyambaka, that is to say, in the order of the Kaula Trika, it must be understood that this implies that he was also a master of the non-Kaula system; and indeed he does once refer to him as a teacher in that domain.” 100. IPVV vol. 2, p. 208, I 17-20: sey splat tatonkal Sudha attri paar tttoam if saranda, iyata saratoarh nivattam yad vitatyeSrtvisamadarSanastraStstre nirdpitarh Sakilaksanena “The syntax (of Utpaladeva’s comment] is that it is this thiety-seventh, pure power ofthe reality-levels tha isthe ultimate realty-level beyond the thity-sixth. This completes his analysis ofthe sense in which [the power of representation] is the ‘essence,’ a matter taught at length in the scripture Trikadardanasra in its definition of Power’ bid, p. 206, 1819: anyatdpi “ya! stra asyajagath sd Saktir malnt pad” ‘And in another source: “The essence ofthis universe is Malini, the power Para’ The same line is quoted in PV vol. 1, p. 211, I. 7-9 as from the Sara (Srsdrastsre). Cf, TA 3.68c, quoted and translated above, Where Abhinavagupta gives ‘the essence’ as one of the terms for the state of blis.Jayaratha ad loc. says that the term is used inthis sense in “such scriptures as the venerable Sara (tram it Srstrabhatt- raladyultan)." For Utpaladeva's term sphuratt ‘the tremor’ Abhinavagupta cites no scriptural authority ‘Taking it to be synonymous with spandak he cites the Spandakarika of Kallata thereon (IPVV vol. 2, p 188, 6-11; IPV vol. 1, p. 208, IL 3-11) For Vsphur in this sense he cites Somananda, Sivas 12 (VV vol. 2p. 299, lL 15; IPV vol. 1, p. 208, I. 4-5). He adds a line from the Urmilaulareava, not found in the surviving short recension of that work, which he takes to be referring to the power of representation ‘when it speaks of “the wave of the waveless ocean of awareness” (drm est viodhahdher nistaraigasya Aevta)(IPVV vol. 2, p. 198, L. 13; TA 4.184 and Jayaratha ad loc., who identifies the source TAV vol. 3 (4), p. 214, IL 10-11}: Stmadarmiiauladto (em, : Kl Keo] armitendpi) For mahtsat2 ‘absolute being’ he cites the Srarahasya [PV vol. 2, p. 203, | 5 Sakti... sattamatasoarapint, an unattributed line wich may of may not be scripture (IPV vol. 1, p. 211, 13: mahdsttd mahadectvigvajfoaname ueyat), and the Kaksyistotra of Divakaravatsa (IPVV vol. 2, p. 203, 8-9: vinasya satid matt skid). He does not cite a line in the surviving recension of the Urmikaularnava which refers to the highest power as both sphurattt and makisttd, exactly asin this line of Utpaladeva’s(f. v4 [2.102ab)} sd “phuratd (core. : sphuratita Cod.) mahdsattakhecarinarssusiddhida, 101. TA 6880-89: straiyambalasentanaitatembarabhskard | dinartrramar me ramus ita apoprathat “This procedure of day and night was revealed to me by Sambhu[natha], who shines like the sun inthe vast sky of the venerable Traiyambaka order!A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 131 It was also to Sambhunatha that he attributed his enlightenment, as the present verse of the Tantrastra makes clear. This special debt to Sambhunatha is more explicitly stated in the Malinfoijayavarttika and Tantrfloka. In the first he writes (1.2-4): yadtyabodhakiranair ullasadbhiht samantatah | viktsihydayambhoja vayarh sa jayatad guruh 112 W sabhimarSasadardharthapatcasrotahsamujjoalan | yah pradan mahyam arthaughan daurgatyadalanavratan 3 1 SrimatsumatisarhSuddhah sadbhaktajanadaksinah | Sambhunathah prasanno me bhityad vakpuspatosital 14 i 2a sariSuddhaht em. : sarisuddha Keo Glory to that master the rays of whose enlightenment shining forth in all directions have opened wide the lotus of my heart. May Sambhunatha be favourable to me, gratified by [this offering] of flowers in the form of words; for purified by the venerable Sumati and ever generous to the devotees of Siva he has transmitted to me a multitude of teachings directed to the destruction of [my] unliberated existence, teachings that shine [with the radiance of] the Trika and the five streams [of the lower Tantras], full of the awareness (that animates those scriptures]. And in the opening verses of the second he writes (1.13): jayatdj jagaduddhytiksamo ‘sau bhagavatya saha Sambhunatha ekah | yadudiritasasandriSubhir me prakato ‘yar gahano ‘pi Sastramargak Wl Glory to the unique Sambhunatha who with [his consort} Bhagavatt has the power to rescue the whole world [from its bondage]; for the rays of his instruction have illuminated this path of the scriptures for me, deeply hidden though it is. : And, after following this verse with a statement of the need for a Paddhati to gi practice in the Trika, he adds (1.16): Sribhatfanathacaranabjayugat tathd Sribhatarikanghriyugalad gurusavitatir ya | bodhanyepasavisanut tadupasanotthabodhojjoalo ‘bhinavagupta idart karoti \ 102, Literally ‘true devotees’ (sadbhakta-). True devotees are those of Siva, just as true gurus (sadguruh) are those consecrated in Saivism, true scriptures (sadApamah) are those revealed by Siva, and true reasoning (ttarlat) is reasoning that proceeds within the limits established by those scriptures. See, eg, TA 433.0430 and Jayaratha ad loc. 103. According to Jayaratha ad loc. Bhagavatt was the name of Sambhundtha’s dat, that is to say, the female partner consecrated for the performance of Kaula worship and the sexual intercourse it entails. Without such a partner, he explains, one cannot be qualified for Kaula practice (TAV vol. 1 [1], 32, 1-3): kuleprakriyayan hi dation antarena keacid api karma nadhikara iti ‘For in the Kaula system one is unqualified for any rite if one has no dats’ Cf. JY Satka 4, £, 12317 (Kalikalapajanimayapaila,v. Zab: saruato dati katte dthino na siddhibdk “tis altogether necessary to have a DAs. One without a Dutt will not succeed.’ This is quoted without attribution by Jayaratha ad TA 296, with corrected Sanskrit in the fist Pada: kurta saroato dati132 Samarasya Abhinavagupta fashions this [work] ablaze with the enlightenment that arose {in him] through serving the order of teachers that annuls the poison of the bondage of unawareness, the order [transmitted to him] from the lotus-feet of the master (Sambhunatha] and his consort." Of Sambhunatha’s life we know very little. But what we do know cautions us against the assumption that the Saivism expounded in these works was a specially Kashmirian affair. For a verse quoted by Jayaratha from an unknown text by Abhinavagupta associates Sambhunatha with Jalandhara, a centre of Sakta devotion in Kangra in the northern Panjab," and tells us that Sumatinatha, the guru of Sambhunatha,™ was a 104. Here I follow Jayaratha ad loc. (TAV vol. 1 [1], p. 34, I. 15-16). However, itis possible that by Bhattandtha and Bhattarika, the Lord and Lady, Abhinavagupta means the couple from which the Kaula lineage of the Trika was believed to have originated [in the Present Age (laliyugam)}, i. Macchandanatha and Koikandmba; see TA 1,7; 2.32ed. Macchandanatha’s role as the Siddha ofthis age is attested in TA 4.267ab and in TAV 1 (1), p. 24112, where introducing 17, in which Abhinavagupta prays forthe favour of Macchanda, Jayaratha calls him the promulgator ofthe Kula and the ‘Lord of the Fourth’ (ladavataraiar: turyanatham), The ‘fourth’ here is evidently the fourth Age, the kaliyugam. 105, Lat. 32° 5114" N,, long, 76° 14’ 46" E, in Kangra town (in the Kangra District), formerly capital of the Katoch State; see Hunter 1886, vol. 7, pp. 429-30. For this and the many other $akta sites in its pilgrimage orbit see the Jalandharapthadipka of Prahladanandacarya Kulavadhsta, Pandey (1963: 12) ‘wrongly asserts concerning Abhinavagupta: “There is, however, no doubt that he went to Jalandhara and learned Kaulika literature and practices from Sambhunatha.” The statement from which he draws this unwarranted conclusion is only that Sambhundtha became well known from that Piha (TAY vol. 1 [1], p. 236, L 9: prasdhi agamajjalandharat phat). 106, Here I disagree with Jayaratha. In TAV vol. 1 (1), p- 235, L. 15-p. 236, 12, he claims, following the opinion of unnamed ‘experts in the ines of transmission’ (Ayatiramavidat), that Sumatinatha was succeeded by ofe Somadeva and that it was the later rather than Sumatinatha himself that taught Abhinavagupta’s guru Sambhundtha: sumatyanteodsina iti érisomadevadayah. Srisumatindthasya ‘rtsomadevah Ssyah tasya Srigambundthe iti hy dytikramavidah “The “pupils of Sumati” [mentioned in 1.2134] are Somadeva and others. For those who know the lines of transmission say thatthe pupil of Sumatinatha was Somadeva and that Sambhunatha was the pupil ofthe latter’ As intemal evidence for this intermediary Jayaratha proceeds to cite TA 37.61: Srisomatak sakalait ka Sambiundta, where Abhinavagupta does indeed appear to refer to Sambhunétha as ‘omniscient from [or after] Soma.’ Soma, of course, could well be a bkimaoa! abbreviation for Somadeva. Therefore, he argue, the places in which Abhinavagupta refers to Sumati as Sambhunatha’s teacher (TA 5.41; TA 10287; and a verse from an unknown work quoted in TAV vol 1 [1], p. 236, I. 68) must be construed to be refrting to him as his teacher's teacher (paramaguroubhiprayens), or, alternatively, as his teacher without reference toa particular position in the lineage, in accordance withthe principle of TA 10.287 that one's whole lineage isto be seen non-dualisically as a single teacher (TAV vol. 1 [1], p. 236 I. 10-12). But it is altogether incredible that Abhinavagupta should have referred to his guru as the pupil of Sumatindtha in ether ofthese senses. Jayaratha's or rather his source's conclusion that he did so rests solely on this one reference to Soma in TA 37.61. He offers no other evidence and would surely have done so if it had existed. I propose that the evidence ofthis single passage is illusory, the reference to Soma having arisen through a simple scribal error, in which the ablative érisomatak ‘from the venerable Soma’ entered in place of a nominative srscunatah, qualifying Sambhunathah in the meaning ‘the venerable (6-9 pupil of Sumati (-sumatah’. The reading érisomatah that produced the intermediary Somaldeva] is in any case syntactically awkward. In its place I propose a reading that is natural, that supposes 2 very minor error on the part ofa scribe, post-consonantal 9 and au being commonly confused in both >A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 133 resident of ‘the seat (pifham) of the Deccan’” by which he probably means Pamagiri'™ or Kaulagiri (Kolhapur). ® That the Kaula Trika was prevalent in the Deccan at this time is confirmed by the Jain author of the prose romance Yasastilaka. Written in Mysore around the middle of the tenth century and therefore probably during the life of Sumatinatha, it refers to the Kaula Trika more than once."” There is also the evidence of the Urmikaularava in its 700 verse redaction. This work teaches a form of Krama Kaulism and was known, in another recension, to Abhinavagupta. It claims that as soon as it had > 107. 108, 108, 0. script and pronunciation, and that is consistent with the three other references to Sambhunatha as Sumati's successor. TAV vol. 1 (1), p. 236, I 7-10: kaScid daksinabhamiptthavasatih Sriman vibhur bhaireoakpafcasrotei satinargeoibhave Sastre vidhata ca yah | lok “bhat sumats atak samudabhat tasyaiva Sgydgranthsrinah chamblar iti prasddhim agamaj jalandharat pfhatak‘{Incarate] among men was the extraordinary (asc) {guru} Sumat, a glorious and all-powerful Bhairava who dwelt in (the sacred site that is] the seat [ofthe goddess] in the Deccan (datsinabhamipiizonsatit), an author of works (vihaid) on Savism (sre) in its five streams and the glorious Kula (satinargavibhave). He was succeeded by his principal disciple, the glorious Sambhu{natha], who achieved renown through [the power of the sacred site that is] the seat [of the goddess in] Jalandhara’ ‘The Kaulas speak of three seats (pithah) of the Goddess, namely, Uddiyana (in the Swat valley), Kamardpa (in Assam) and Parnagiri, or, more commonly, four, namely, those and Jalandhara in Kangra. For the three see the Nisisrictra paraphrased in TA 15.84-85 and quoted by Jayaratha ad loc. (TAY vol. 9 [15], p. 48, I. 4-9). For the more common set of four, with the addition of a fifth, the Mataaga Pitha, in the post-Trika system of the Kuldliimnays see the unattributed verse quoted in Maharthamanjarparimala p. 98, l. 1-2 and Schoterman 1982, pp. 53-60 on Salsthasrasarihitd 136-49, There Parnagir is referred to by the name Sahya, ie. the Sahy3dri or Western Ghats. That Pornagiri was in the Decean is also indicated by the Manthinabhirvatantra, Kumérthanda f. 18: atha ttylart ‘aye ytha Dhaat tac chymu | “koa cid (core. : koa ci Cod.) desan tatha ramyantdesendm utamar idk sisadaksinadighhage daksindpathamandalant |... bharaots tara pacdlat parwnagirgsamdgalh, Lat. 16" 41'N, long. 74° 17'E. The identity of Kaulagiri, also called variously Kuladri Kolagic, Kollagici, Kullagiri, Kolagiri, and Kollagiri, with Kolhapur (Kolapura, Kollspura) is indicated by the fact thatthe 700-verse Urmiaularnava refers to it as the abode of Mahalakgm (f. 27-5): pthintarnh Prive | kaulgiryabhidhanarh tu mahdlaksrtitetanam, For the famous Mahdlakgm temple of Kolhipur see, eg, Yazdani 1960, pp. 441-42 (Kollapura-Mahalakgm). Indeed local tradition has it that Kolhapur has grown up around the temple. In Kaula texts the ste of Mahalaksmnt is generally ge, as here. Thus in accounts ofthe eight Sakta igetras (Prayaga, Varanasi, Kollagis, Attahasa, Jayant, Carita, Ekamra, and Devikotta (see, eg., Nifisaricdra 4.103: kolagirya mahalatgmt, and Kubjikimata 22.25¢:kolgirye rally) But variants in which -pura or pur takes the place of gsi do appear from time to time. Thus, in accounts of the same eight sites, see Guhyasiddhi f. 7v2: kolapurydm; and the Paddhati ‘Kalitklokramareana f, 20v7-21e1 -ollapura. Kollspura inthe latter has been substituted forthe form Kullagic that appears in the Madhavakla (Y Satin 4, 124: attohasat sitasthan carta ca karadrat Aullagirytpriye “harne (core. : karmart Cod.]*jayantya[corr.:jayarhtya Cod.) cottardyane), which the Paddhati reports that itis following here, and is Sanskritized as Kaulagir in Abhinavagupta’s version of the passage in TA 28.59-64 (59: affahasam sikhasthane cartram ca karandhrake | Srutyoh kaulagirit nasarandhrays ea jayantikrn). Somadeva, Yasastilake, pt. 1, p. 43, Il. 4-5: sakalajanasadhdrane'pi svadehe trikematadttsitasyeva evabhayendtbhinivizamanasya; and pt. 2, p. 269, |. 14: sarvegu peyapeyabhakgyabeksyadisu niatlactad vrtiad iti kulaceryah. tatha ca trikamatoktih madirdmadaneduraoadanastarasarasaprapennahrdayah savyapiréeanivesitasaktih Saktimudrasanadharah svayam ummahefoardyamanah krgnaye SarvanlSearam Aradhayed iti, The work was completed in aD 959 near Dharwar; see Handiqui 1989, pp. 34.134 Samarasya been revealed by Srinatha in Kamartipa it was carried by Siddhas to Kaulagiri, “the home of Mahalaksmi,” namely, Kolhapur in Karnataka." Given the fervour of Abhinavagupta’s acknowledgements of his indebtedness to Sambhunatha we are bound to ask to what extent his exposition of the Malinivijayottara is or is not original. The original is hard to establish: what appears so may have been drawn unacknowledged from sources now lost; and what is actually original may well have disguised itself in a system whose authority rests on the claim that its teachers merely clarify what the scriptures have already revealed. What we can do with certainty is to demonstrate that certain teachings are definitely not original, because Abhinavagupta himself has attributed them to Sambhunatha. These debts are numerous and in many cases fundamental to the character of his system. Here it must suffice to say that they include what is perhaps the most striking feature of Abhinavagupta’s Trika, namely, the grounding of the three goddesses Para, Parapard, and Apard in Kalasathkarsini and the widespread incorporation of allied Krama doctrine, notably that of the cycle of the twelve Kalis who are the very core and signature of that Sakta system. As for what may be original, it is noteworthy that he does not acknowledge Sambhunatha for the crucial interpretation of the passage of the eighteenth chapter of the Malintvijayottara quoted above, in which he finds the basis for the view that the Trika rises to an all-accommodating universality beyond its Kaula Mata levels. This doctrine 111, rmialarnaoa f, 26v8-27e5: mahtkaularsavoddhrtam | armiaulamavark gubyar:lksapidark makddbatar | nana sribhogahastakhyart guhyakauleti gate | “tasmad (corr. tas Cod.) doadasastharar:kawlarjant samuddharet | paroasatka*doaytd (core. : doaya Cod.) deo trmikzulamahiret | “savlsepa (cor: step Cod.) dha deo ida Sstrottamottamam | sardhatrinisahasray! mubbakauleti vrata | tsmat “tran (corr. : sara Cod.) samuahytya *gukyart (core. guhya Cod.) saptasatabhidham\ dart rahasyar:parcmart Fhecartoaktragocaram | mghaksetre kamardpe Srindthena prakasitam | samsthitamt tatra devesi snginigukyasasanant | anyasatladoaydd bhadre matauliraatbhidhar \ kulamadyad (cor. : madd Cod.) dataiatert bhogahastarnaveti ca | ttasmad (corr. tasmd Cod.) doadasasahasra! stram etad udthrtak | ‘yathyatomataneKhecarair nth pithontaram priye | kaulagiryabhizhanam tu mahdlksmtnietaran ‘Extracted from the Mahakaularnava the secret Urmiaulirava, ina quarter of a lakh of verses (25,000, for 24,000], most wonderful, is called the Bhoguhasta or the Gutyakaula. From that was extracted the Kaulrdja in 12,000. From [these] fist two six thousands ofthe Urmiaularsac this supreme teaching was extracted by abridgement, O Goddess, in 3500 [verses], and known as the Mulaaula. Srnatha extracted this 700 redaction] from that as its concealed essence, the supreme secret within the oral tradition of the Yoginis, and revealed it in Kamarupa, There, O Empress of the gods, this secret teaching of the Yoginis remained. From the other two six thousands, known as the Mahikaularava, O Virtuous one, the Blogahastarszon in 1000 [verses] was distilled. As soon as [the text of 700 verses] had been explained it was taken by Siddhas, O beloved, to another Seat, to the abode of Mahalaks called Kaulagi.’ That it was the 700 rather than the 1000 that isto be understood as having been taken to Kaulagi is evident from the chapter colophons, which refer to the work as follows: .. . rtmadarmitaularsave mahdittre lotsapadoddhte paramarahasye Sribhogahastakramanndye Srikaulagiriptthavinigate Sriminandthtoatirite satatadhtaate kulakaulanirgaye.... ‘Tn the great scripture Urmilzultryaoa extracted from the 25,00, in the supremely secret Bhogahasta Krama system, in the 700 [verse redaction of that work] that came forth from the Kaulagiri Seat and was revealed by Minanatha, in the Kulatzulanreaya 112, See TA 5.41; 15.3510-352b; 29.95; 38.32cd.A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 135 may well have been elaborated by Abhinavagupta himself, along with its correlation. with higher non-dualism in the metaphysical domain — a position which he bases on this same passage —, and the correlation of that non-dualism with the nature of the fourth goddess. THE MEANING OF THE VERSE: DOING AND KNOWING The heart of which Abhinavagupta speaks in this third verse is the all-encompassing consciousness invoked in his opening verse. He proclaims that he was that same consciousness contracted in the mode of unenlightened duality until Sambhunatha bestowed the initiation that culminated in his enlightenment. He now invites his readers to behold and scrutinize this state; and by using the demonstrative pronoun etat (‘this’) he indicates that it can be seen and scrutinized. It is perceptible in two senses. Firstly, it is embodied in the teaching set before his audience in this work — Abhinavagupta’s state of enlightenment is his immersion in ultimate reality; that reality is the subject of the Malinivijayottara; and this Tantrasdra serves to reveal its meaning. Secondly, it is already eternally and everywhere present to all as the ground and substance of their consciousness. Through this double meaning he encompasses all three of the highest means of self-realization, namely, the study of revealed truth (agamal), reasoning in support of that truth (yuktih, sattarkah), and direct intuition (sodnubhavah), either the third alone or the third nurtured by the first and second. But if liberation is a matter of self-knowledge what of the rituals of worship and other prescribed actions that are the greater part of salvific religion for the majority of Saivas? He alludes to his position on this crucial matter when he says at the close of the verse that the purpose of gaining knowledge of ultimate reality is precisely to accomplish this duty of worship (mahesapajanahetoh). By this he means two things: firstly that the worship required of initiates works only because it is a form of knowing, a contemplation. of reality supported by encoding in symbolic action; and secondly, and more radically, that ritual actions are dispensable for those who can sustain that knowledge without their support, this self-knowing rather than its outer forms being the essence of the worship of a Mahesvara who is indeed none other than one’s own innermost identity. This pre- eminence of knowledge over ritual sets the Trika’s soteriology in stark opposition to that of the Saiddhantika Saiva tradition then dominant in Kashmir." Having alluded to it at the end of the preliminary verses he proceeds in the preface that follows to expound it systematically as the theoretical basis of his entire exposition. 113. For the terms of the opposition between the Trika and the Siddhanta over the roles of knowledge and ritual action in the Saiva’s attainment of liberation see Sanderson 1995.Appendix Jayaratha’s Interpretation of the First Verse The exact meaning of the first verse is not yielded without effort. For Abhinavagupta has chosen to open his work with a conundrum based on paronomasia, the use of words in more than one sense (slesalt). To grasp the whole statement intended by the author one must read two meanings in some part of a verse; or read the whole verse in more than one meaning, so that one form of words is to be resolved into two or more disconnected whole statements. Such paranomasia, which is common in Sanskrit poetry, is usually penetrated without much difficulty with the help of the context and the conventions that restrict the field of expression. But here Abhinavagupta has chosen his vocabulary and phrasing in such a way that it is not easy to decide whether the paronomasia is pervasive or partial. Nor is it easy to determine which meanings are intended in which reading. In the interpretation which I propose in my translation, the paronomasia is not pervasive — there is therefore only one statement — and it is deployed in the poetic figure samidsoktik or ‘concise expression.’ There two meanings, one explicit and the other implicit, are conveyed by some or all of the terms that qualify the subject (in this case ‘my heart... embodying the bliss of the ultimate’). Of the two the explicit meaning is the principal subject-matter (prakaranika-), and the implicit meaning the tangential (aprataranita.)" 1 have marked the beginning and end of the two meanings by enclosing them between braces, put the explicit meaning before the implicit, marked the boundary between them with an oblique stroke, and set out the principal subject-matter in the roman and the subordinate in italic type. Jayaratha, however, when he encounters this same verse at the beginning of the Tantraloka, interprets it not as a single statement in which the paronomasia is limited to a part, but as three independent statements expressed concurrently by means of double paronomasia throughout the verse. The first and second express the view of the ultimate reality according to the Trika and Krama respectively. The third refers to Abhinavagupta’s conception in the Kaula union of his parents. The three meanings he proposes, with his principal explanatory glosses within square brackets and explanatory insertions of my own in parentheses within them are as follows. I have added after each his summary of its point. Meaning 1 (Trika): May my heart (mama hrdayari) [the reality of the self (Gimanas tathyart vastu)} expand (vikasatat [<— -sphuratat]) fully (samyak{ — sarit}), embodying (kulari Sarfram yasya [<— kulavi]) the highest (anuttara-) 114, See Alaikarasarcasoa, Stra 32; Kavyaprakasa 10.11ab.A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara and deathless (-amrta-) [Ama, (the inexhaustible ‘seventeenth lunar phase’ [saptadast kala], the power that nourishes the universe) (amakhyakeldsvaripart)], comprising the emission (-visargamayart) [whose nature is the urge (of consciousness) to manifest itself externally (bakirullilasisasvabhavah), spontaneously] manifested [svata evollasitasattakah (< -sphuritabhava-)] from the fusion (sartghattah [<— -ydmala-]) of these two (tadubhaya-): the ‘mother’ (janani), [the power of pure autonomy (Suddhasvatantryasaktirapa)] whose nature (svaripart [<— -ASrayal) is unlimited (vigatd mala avacchedaka yasyah [— vimala-}) action (kala), [the state of agency that is one with absolute representation (paravimarSaikasoabhavakartytdlaksand)], whose (all-encompassing] effulgence (mahah pariparna*laksanas [em. : laksanari Keo] tejahspharo yasya [<— -mah@]) is in [the pure universe (Suddhadhvamarge) that constitutes] the primal (adyayam [<— -abhinava-]) creation (-srsfi-), and the ‘father’ (janakah), his nature (soabhavah [<— -tanub) all-containing (pdriparnyena paritt [< bharita- )), maintaining (pariparita prabandhenanuvartamand [<= -gupta-]) his desire (abhilagah [<— -rucift]) [to perform the five cosmic functions (paricakrtyavisayah)] by grace of his five (paiica-) powers (Saktibhih [<— -mukha-]) [of consciousness, bliss, desire, cognition, and action (cidanandecchajfianakriyatmabhih)]."* 137 Summary: ‘Thus in order to destroy the multitude of hinderers he has referred in this [meaning] to the Nameless, the ‘ultimate triad’ (parari trikam) that is the fusion of Siva and his Power, which because its nature is the flow of emission, is the seed of the world’s diversity." ° Meaning 2 (Krama): May there shine forth for me (mama sarisphuratat em, : sartsphuratat Keo), [may I realize my identity with (tadatmyenaikah syam ity arthah),] the heart (hydayam) (that is the radiance of Kalasarhkarsini pulsating in intimation of the whole cycle of powers from Srstikall onwards (Srisstikalyadyakhilasakticakrasatranena prasphuradraparh Srikala*sartkarsintdhama (corr. : sarikarsantdhama Kep])], the ultimate (anuttara-), [since emanation, stasis, and resorption are dissolved in it (srstyadindm atraiva layat)], the liquid ambrosia (-amrta-) [that is the ecstatic relish of one’s own identity (suitmacamat- araparamarthart)], the Nameless (andkhyarapam [<— -kulara)), that is one with (-mayari) the diverse emanation (vividhak sargah [< -visarga-] [that constitutes the stasis (sthityatma)] manifested (-sphuritabhava-) from the mingling (loltohavak [<— -yamala-], tatal) of the two [(flows of) emission and withdrawal (at... srstisariharatmakam ubhayarh, tasya (€ -tadubhaya-], that is, from the mingling] of the ‘mother’ (janani), [so called because she gives birth to the universe (janayati visvam iti), that is to say, the Nameless Goddess Awareness (anakhyaiva bhagavatt sarvit), Siva’s highest power that is the source of the 15, 116, Extracted from TAV vol. 1 (2), p. 4, kp. 7, L10. TAY vol (1), p.7, ll 1-13: tad eoom atra visargaprasrasoabhtostvena jagadoaciryabjabatarhSiaSatisa- shattatmakaparatrikasabdavacyam: andkhyatmakar vighnaughapradhwarhsaya parémrstam. Jayaratha’s source for the term ‘ultimate triad” (parart tram) in this sense, ie. the fusion of Siva and his power, is MVV 115-20, a passage on the ‘heart’ of consciousness which very probably informed Abhinavagupta’s composition of this verse, and certainly clarifies it138 Samarasya cycles beginning with emission (para paramesvart srstyadicakradya)), grounded in (@lambanart gatir yasyak [« -aSraya]) the pure (vimala-) phase (-kald-) [that is the first (adibhata) of the phases of the moon of consciousness (candramasi), and therefore full of the perfect nectar that nourishes the universe (sakalajagadapyayakaripardmptamayfty arthah)], the splendour (mahas teat [— -mahd}) [of her automony (svdtantryalaksanart) engaged in the ever-new (abhinava-), [ever-radiant (sada dyotamanayart)] creation (-srsti-) [that is her extroversion (bahirapatayart)], and the ‘father’ (janakah), [the ultimate conscious subject corresponding to this state (abhirapah parah pramata)], who guards (gupta . . pariraksita [<— -gupta-] his radiance ( -rucih) [by means of introversion (svdvastambhabalena), (maintained) by drawing in the various objects of awareness (tattadvisayaharanena)] through the pathways (mukhaih ... dvaraih [€ -mukha-]) of the five (paricanam [€ -parica-}) [flow powers: VameSvari, (Khecari, Dikeari, Gocari,) and (Bhiicart) (vamesvyddioahasaktinart), that is to say, through the operations of sight and the other faculties of perception (caksuradindriyaorttirapaih)].” Summary: ‘In this [reading] the author refers to the supreme, nameless consciousness of Paramesvara, which manifests itself as the three sequences of emission (sth), [stasis (sthitit),] and {withdrawal (sariharah)], yet is ever radiant beyond them, incorporating both [this] succession and the non-successsive [reality which pervades it] uy. m8, 19, Meaning 3 (Abhinavagupta’s origin in Kaula union): May my heart (mama hydayarit (em. : hrdayarit Keo), (the reality that is the rising of my inner vitality (nijabalasamudbhatilaksanart tattvart)] Fully (samyak [< -sari]) expand (vikasatat [€ -sphuratat]) [by penetrating the experience and understanding of all (soroasya . . . prakhyopakhyarohena)). Its source (akaro [em. : akiro Ken) yasya [€ -kulari)) is the two highest (utkrste [<— -anuttara-]) Nectars (-amrta), the Essences (sare) [superior because their being contemplated in various ways, for example, as two deities, one white and the other red, differentiates them from the semen and (menstrual) blood of the uninitiated (Svetarunatmadevatamayatddyanusaridhanena pasusukrasonitavailaksanyad)]; for it originated in (prakrtir yasya [< -mayam]) the ejaculation (ksepah [= -visarga- )) [the outflow of the two bodily substances together termed Kundagola (kundagolakhyadravyavisesanihsyandah), brought about] by (tena) the ecstasy (ollasah . .. bhava [< -sphuritabhava-]) of sexual union (experienced) in the Prior Worship (Adyayagadhiradham mithunam, tasya [€ -ydmala-]) of (my) two (tadubhayari, tasya [<~ -tadubhaya-]) [parents (matapitrlaksanari)]," (my) mother (jananf) [Vimala (vimalabhidhand)] ‘whose base is the syllables vi-ma- 1a (vimaletivarnakala asraya dlambanam yasyah sd [<— -vimalakalasraya]), for Extracted from TAV vol. 1 (0), p: 8,17. 11, L120. AV vol. 1 (1), p. 11, U. 10-14 ata granthaye spytdicematrayaripatim cabhisayanty api adatoartanena parisphurantt kramakramavapuh paraiodnakhya pdramescartsartoit pardmrst. ‘The term ‘Prior Worship’ (adiyagak, adyaytgah) denotes the Kaula ritual of sexual union; see TA 28.164; JY Satka 4, f, 208v2-206e7 (Adyayapavidhikramarthapajapatlah),‘A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 139 whom Abhinavagupta’s (abhinavaguptasya [< -abhinava-]) birth (janma [<- srsti-]) was the occasion of great rejoicing (maha utsavo yasyah [< -mahd]), and my father (janakah), famed far and wide (dtpti, sarvatra prathd, yasya [ -rucih]) [under the name (savjjiaya)] [Narasishhagupta (- paricamukhagupta-)], [both] replete (<~ bharitatanuh) [with their immersion in the state of identification with Siva and Sakti]. Summary: ‘Here, because [he tells us that] he is the product of such a union, that is to say, of the union of parents who were essentially a Siddha and a Yogint, the author claims that he himself is a receptacle of the non-dual knowledge that is the ultimate goal. This is in accordance with what he has said [in Tantraloka 29.162c-163b]: “Anyone whose body has been formed from the bud of such a mingling, is termed ‘born of a Yoginl’ (voginibhah). He is automatically the receptacle of knowledge, [automatically] a Rudra.” And in this way he conveys his fitness to compose a work which is a summary of the fundamentals of all the Trika’s scriptures.” 1 follow Jayaratha in seeing the verse as referring not only to ultimate reality but also to the author's parentage and conception. For reasons set out above its character as a propitious benediction (astroadah) guarantees that the principal meaning is an invocation of that reality embodied in the fusion of Bhairava and the goddess; but the reader is prompted to look for a second meaning by the attenuation and abnormality of some of the qualifiers in this sense. The starting point from which he would begin to unravel this, hidden meaning is, I propose, the word janakah ‘father.’ While the goddess is not uncommonly addressed as the ‘mother’ (janant, etc.) in this literature, Bhairava or Siva is, never addressed as ‘the father’ (janakah, etc.). The meaning can be accommodated only by accepting an unconventional, metaphorical usage of the term. One looks, then, to see whether janakalt and janant may not also be intended in their familiar sense of ‘father’ and ‘mother’ through paranomasia, and one’s suspicion once alerted finds confirmation by discovering the names of both parents and their offspring buried in periphrasis and abbreviation: vimalakalagraya ‘based in the phonemes vi, ma, and la’ or ‘based on [ie. named after] the pure (vimala-) phase (-kala)’ for Vimala, the author's mother, paricamukhagupta- (Sitnhagupta) for Narasithagupta, his father, and abhinava- for Abhinavagupta. The remaining second meanings then impose themselves as translated. Apart from the fact that I co-ordinate this meaning with the principal I differ from Jayaratha here only in taking the expression anuttardmytakulam as part of the section of the verse that is free of paranomasia, meaning ‘the fusion of the ultimate and [its] nectar.’ Jayaratha, as we have seen, also takes it in reference to Abhinavagupta’s conception, in the meaning ‘whose source is the two highest nectars.’ I differ on this for two reasons. In the first place I take the verse as a single statement. In this interpretation the Sanskrit 120, Extracted from TAV vol. 1 (1), p- 12, L 2-p. 14,1 11, 121. For the Sansksit see above, n. 33.140 Samarasya reads well poetically only if the part with paranomasia and that without it are self- contained. In the order of my English translation, anuttardmytakulam could be taken in two meanings without the two parts interlocking, One could simply move the first brace back to the point between ‘May my heart shine forth’ and ‘embodying the bliss of the ultimate’ and add the second meaning in the parallel position after the oblique stroke. But in the Sanskrit the words translated ‘May my heart shine forth embodying the bliss. of the ultimate’ come not at the beginning of the verse but as the last of its four lines, and in an order of words which begins with the subject (‘heart’ [hydayam]) and ends with the verb (‘may [it] shine forth’ [sarisphuratat}), with the attribute in question and the possessive pronoun (‘my’ [mama]) between the two (lrdayam anuttardmrtakulayt mama santsphurait). Consequently, if anuttaramytakulam had two meanings the part with only one would be split in two by an additional element of paranomasia in the final line. If anuttardmtakulam is not taken in more than one sense, as I propose, we have an aesthetically satisfactory and common pattern, in which a verse builds itself up to be resolved only at its end and at all once with the disclosure of the subject and verb. If we accept Jayaratha’s view that anuttardmrtakulam has this additional meaning, so that paranomasia re-emerges after the subject (lizdayam) has been disclosed, then the verse will shudder to a halt rather than glide smoothly to fulfilment. But there is a further reason for rejecting Jayaratha’s, interpretation. For if, as he claims, anuttardmrtakulam also refers to the semen and menstrual blood of Abhinavagupta’s parents, the author will have clumsily repeated himself; for these two substances are none other than the ‘emissions’ (visargal) mentioned earlier in the verse. Once Jayaratha had decided that Abhinavagupia intended his verse to be read not as one statement but as several, he was bound to work out parallel meanings throughout That he was mistaken in doing so is revealed by the awkwardness of the meaning he has. assigned to anutiardmytakulam in his third reading; but it is even more evident from the arbitrariness of the interpretations that provide two metaphysical readings, one. in the language of the Trika and another in that of the Krama. I see only the first. One is pointed in the direction of the reference to the author's origin in Kaula worship by the terms ‘mother’ and ‘father’; but there is nothing of this kind in the metaphysical reading to lead one from the principal doctrinal basis of the text to the Krama, no terms which are more at home in the latter and have to undergo interpretation to fit the former. The only basis I can see for the second meaning is the inclination of the exegete, Jayaratha or a predecessor, to read it in. The verse opens a work that weaves the Krama into the heart of the Trika. Since it encapsulates the teaching that is to follow, why should it not refer both to the Trika and the Krama? There is no reason why it should not and good reason why it might. All that is lacking is internal evidence that it did. And if this meaning is present even though it is not signalled, may there not be yet other meanings which can be read in the verse by a determined commentator? Jayaratha tells us that other possible readings had indeed been proposed, but that he has passed over them in silence for two‘A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara i reasons. In the first place he fears their explanation would overburden his text. In the second he maintains that they do not contribute to the principal subject-matter." In other words the justification for his Krama reading is that itis possible and relevant, whereas these are possible but irrelevant or not directly relevant. This style of exegesis governed by possibility rather than probability is more appropriate to the texts of scripture, which as divine revelation are not thought to be tied to the semantic limits that restrain human beings when they attempt to convey their meaning to others in ordinary or poetic utterances. Whereas human statements are assumed to be unitary, however complex, a scriptural passage may be treated without apology as conveying simultaneously as many meanings as are possible within the limits set by the exegete’s beliefs and the generous disciplines of traditional text-analysis."® In this regard one may bear in mind the enormous prestige of the Tantraloka and the divine status that came to be attributed to its author. 122, TAV vol. 1 (1), p. 15 I. 3-5: atra ca saribhavanty api vyakhyantardn na kant granthagauraoabhayit praktanupayogte ca Though yet other readings ofthis [verse] are possible they have not been given, for fear of overburdening the text, and because they do not serve the subject-matter [that isthe immediate concern of this chapter)’ 123. Perhaps the most striking example of this is the exegesis ofthe Pardtriika in Abhinavagupta's PTV (especially p.193, 1. -p. 197, 1.7 [Keo pp. 1932], giving sixteen semantic analyses ofthe word enutaram, and p. 262, 1 16p. 269, 11 (Kap pp. 223-2), giving nine interpretations of v. 9 and sixteen meanings to the words trtiyart Brahma in that verse). By the disciplines of text-analysis I mean grammatical analysis (cyutpatih) and semantic analysis (niroacanam). Both provide the exegete with considerable room for manoeuvre. He need show only that the meaning he attributes to a sentence does not infringe the rules of grammar. It is not necessary to consider how far the expression of that meaning through those words conforms to normal usage, word-order and the like. It is enough that the meaning is not grammatically impossible. Semantic analysis is even more flexible. It enables an exegete to insert the meaning he seeks by deriving a word artificially from the meanings of verbal roots that resemble the sounds or syllables that compose it (algaravarnasdmayat); see Kahes 1998, p. 37, quoting Yaska: aksaraoaryasdmanyan nirbrayat ‘One may analyse on the basis of similarities of syllables or sounds,’ Abhinavagupta echoes these words in PTV. p. 268, 1. 23-24 (Kim p. 24): tatht ca vedavytkarane paramesvaresu ‘ca sastresu (con). : Sastresu Gnoli, Keo) mantradtksaditabdeso asaravarnasimyan niroaconam upapannam ‘In the explanation of the Veda and in fexplaining] such ‘words as mantrak and diksa in the Saiva scriptures it is proper to analyse meaning on the bass of similarity of sounds or syllables.” 124, See, eg. Isoarspatyabhijavimarsntoydkhyaf. 121-6 (transcribed by the editor in Bhaskar, vol. 2, p. 568) ina vivanujighrtsaya paramasiva eva sokalabhamandalottare srimaccharadadioyakridasane Sritasmiradese Srinarestthaguptasahadharmactrinyarh Srimatyarh vimalayan Ilaytoatirya Srimadabhinavaguptandtha iti prsiddhanamadheyo ‘Out of his desire to favour mankind Paramasiva himself freely descended into this [world taking birth] through Vimala, the pious wife of Narasimhagupta in the land of Kashmir, the celestial pleasure-seat of Sarada, the blessed Goddess [of learning], the best [place] on the whole disc of the earth, [and was] known by the name Abhinavagupta;’ and Madhuraja of Madurai, Garunsthaparamarsa 6ed: janoasaktaikahastasphutalem.:hastah sphuta Kso)paramasivajanamudratseitro vanasripanipadmasphuritanakhamukhair vadayan nddavinam | érikanthesavatarah paramakarvnay riplakaémiradesak | Sriman nah patu saksad abhinavavapusa dakginamirtidevak ‘May the glorious incamation of Lord Srikantha, the divine Dakginamorti, who out of his supreme compassion came to the land of Kashmir in the form of Abhinavagupta protec us, with one hand on his knee showing the >142 Samarasya Thold, then, that Abhinavagupta, intended only one metaphysical reading, and that this, when embellished with the secondary, tangential reference to his origin, constitutes the whole meaning of the verse. Abbreviations BOR cH con) Et FF Ipy Ivy Iv ke KSTS mvur 135. Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum My conjectural emendation My correction Epigraph Indica My emendation Institut francais d’Indologie oarapratyabhijntvimarsint oarapratyabhijaavivrtivimarsint JInyadrathayamala ‘The reading of the edition of the KSTS Kashmir Series of Texts and Studies Malintojayottara gesture of Siva's supreme knowledge and [holding] a rosary, and playing the NAdavid lute with the bright tips ofthe nails of his lotuslke venerable left hand.’ This verse was taken by Pandey (1963: 21- 22) as a “pervpicture” of Abhinavagupta, In fact, it presents him artificially, imposing the southindian iconography of the four-armed Dakginamarti Siva in his musical aspect (eyamarih), in which he shows the gesture of knowledge or exposition (vydthyanamudra), holds the Vina and a rosary, and commonly has a hand resting upon his knee. He is seated surrounded by sages whom he is instructing, just as Abhinavagupta is described seated in the midst ofall his pupils inv. 5a of this composition (asinak ksemarajaprabhrtibhir akkila sevitah Sigyavargait). For the iconography of Daksinamart, Siva as the bestower of knowledge, se Kamikdgams 251.19, 10-14, 21-25, 30-40, cited by Bhat ad Rawrutgana, Krigtpada 35.287-292; Dptagara p68, 8-13 (1.153156) (also cited by Bhat ad Ajtgoma, Kridpada 136.254-255); Kirandguma 2.174b-178, 187-190, 199b-194a cited iid ‘That the [arapratyabhijvimarsinfoyaiyt is south-Indian is strongly suggested by its citing sources that though rooted in the traditions of Kashirian Saiva non-dualism (1) were not known in Kashmir before modern times, (2) have been transmitted only in south-Indian manuscripts, and (3) have received commentaries only from and been cited only by authors who are south-indian or who, ike Bhaskarardya, had assimilated south-Indian traditions. A case in point i the PerdirihSlalaghuorti (Gited in that work on p. 4, Il 34; and p. 5.6 and 17-18). Tis is attributed to Abhinavagupta by its colophon, and that atzibution has been accepted without question by modern scholars. But there are good reasons to conclude thatthe attribution is spurious. In addition to the thre eriteria for doubt just stated it (4) shows a redaction ofthe Parisi (/Parariita) that deviates from that adopted by [Abhinavagupta in the Pardtrilavivarana, a much longer commentary on this text that is certainly bis, (6) deviates from the views and approach of that commentary, and (6) lacks the hallmarks of Abhinavagupta's style and, in my estimation, his intellectual briliance | thank my pupil Isabelle Ratié,agrégée de philosophie, of the 5th Section (Sciences Relgieses) ofthe Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes (Pais), for urging me to publish this after reading it inthe form, revised and expanded here, in which I wrote it in 195, also for commenting on my view ofthe poetics of the first verse, and for helping me to check the proofs.A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 143 ag ‘Malintijayavarttika NAK National Archives of Nepal, Kathmandu NGMPP Nepal-German Manuscript Preservation Project pv Paratrisikavivarana sor Soacchandatantra SoTU Soncchandatantroddyota TA Tantraloka TAV Tantralokaviveka References PRIMARY SOURCES: MANUSCRIPTS AND EDITIONS Agamaprimanya of Yamunacarya, ed. Rama Mishra Shastri, Reprint from The Pandit, Benares, 1987 Ajtégana, ed. N.R. Bhatt. 3 vols. Publications de IIFI No. 24, Pondicherry: IF, 1964, 1967, 199. Alaikrasarosoa of Rajanaka Ruyyaka and Mastkha with the commentary (-vimarsint) of Rajanaka Jayaratha See Dwivedi 1979 Bhagadvadgiarthasarigraha of Abhinavagupta, ed. Rajinaka Laksmana (Lakshman Raina]. Srinagar: Kashmir Pratap Steam Press, 1933, Bhaskar [Sorapratyabhitavimardin? of Abhinavagupta with the commentary (Bhaskar?) of Bhiskarakantha. 2 vols, ed. KR Subrahmania Iyer and KC. Pandey (vol. 1) and MM. Narayana Shastri Khiste (Vol. 2). Allahabad: Superintendent, Printing and Stationery, United Provinces, 1998 and 1950, Bhaoepralasa of Bhavamisra, ed. with a Hindt commentary (Sarotigasundart) by Lalacandraji Vaidya. 2 pts. 3d. Impression. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1968 and 1970. CChummasartketaprakaée of Nigkriyanandanatha. Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, Janert MS. 3771 (D. 112, Ka 387) (Trivsaccarctrahasye). Paper; $arad8. Also known as Chummasampradayaprakisa, ‘The text comprises 105 aphorisms (chum, chummapadani, sartketapadani: from litgu abhijdn to ditto natfo) in a Sanskeitized Old Kashmiri, with a verse frame-story and commentary in Sanskrit, interspersed with thirty verses in Old Kashmiri giving thirty ‘oral instructions’ (kath, cercah), each labelled in Sanskrit (from the pustakakatha to the giiatha). Desiutmamald of Hemacandra, See Pische! 1880, Devieyrdiaiatitt, NAK MS 1-242. NGMPP Reel No. A 161.12 Paper; Newari script. Divanyaloia of Anandavardhana with the commentaries (-locana and -balapriya) of Abhinavagupta and Ramaséraka, ed. Pattabhirama Shastri, Kashi Sanskrit Series 135. Benares: Jaya Krishna Das Hari Das Gupta, 1940, Ditsttare. Institut frangais de Pondichéry MS. T. 17 (Nifoasaktrta, pp, 795-1152). Paper transcript in Devanagari, Diptagama, Institut frangais de Pondichéry MS. T. 507, pp. 533-1051. Paper transcript in Devandgar. Guhysiddh. NAK MS No, 1163 NGMPP Reel No. A 150/38. Paper; Newari script Garunathaperamarée of Madhuraj, ed. P.N. Pushp. KSTS 85. Srinagar, 1960, Isoarapratybhinakrikt of Utpaladeva. See Torella 1994 Isoarepratyabhijidvimarsins of Abhinavagupta, ed. Mukund Ram Shastri, 2 vols. KSTS 22, 33. Bombay, 1918, 1921 [bourapratyabijndoimarsntoyekhya (anonymous). Trivandrum MS 270 (Toarapratycbhijitoyathyaoyakhyt’). Peper Devanagart transcript. ‘ourapratybhitiotioimarsint of Abhinavagupta, ed. Madhusudan Kaul Shastri, 3 vols. KSTS 60, 62,65, Bombay, 1938, 1941, 1943.144 Samarasya Jalundharpitiadpit of Prahladanandacarya Kulavadhata, See Shastri 1983 Jonmamaranavicira of Bhatta Vamadeva, ed, Mukund Ram Shastri. KSTS 19, Bombay, 2018 Jiyadrcthayimale, Satka 1. NAK MS 5-4650 NGMPP Reel B 122/7. Paper; Newari script. Jeyadrathayimals, Sapa 4. NAK MS 1-1468, NGMPP Reel 8 122/4. Paper; Newasi script. Kalisdvidhi of Manodaguru. BORI MS 157 of 1886-92, Paper; Sirads, ‘Kalesttargaimata and Fppanaia. Oxford, Bodleian Library MS Sansk, d. 39 (R) Palm-lea; Newati stip; > 191 Katitatulatranarcana of Vimalaprabodha. NAK MS 55188, NGMPP Reel No. A 148/10. Paper; Newari script Kalialapacasataa, NAK MS 5-358. NGMPP Reel No. B 30/26, Palm-eaf; Newari script ‘Kavyidaréa of Dandin, ed. Rangacharya Raddi Shastri. 2nd edn. Poona: BORI, 1970. ‘Kavygpraiaa of Mammata with the commentary of Stidhara, ed. Sivaprasad Bhattacharya. 2 vols. Calcutta Sanskeit College Research Series 7, 15. Calcutta, 1959, 1961. Kiraaryti, See Goodall 1988, Kubjktmate: The Kubjlamatatantra. Kulaikimnaya Version, ed, T. Goudrisan and J.A. Schoterman, Leiden: Beil, 1988. Kulopaeatita. NAK MS 1-1076. NGMPP Reel No. A 40/13. Palmeleaf, Kula script, ¢ ao 11001200 Kulasir, NAK MS 4-137. Reel No. NGMPP 4/137. Palm-leaf, early Nagerl. Read in a draft of an edition prepared by Dr. Somdev Vasudeva (Oxford). “Mahinayapraia (Old Kasturi) with a Sanskrit commentary (viet) by Rajanaka Sitkantha, ed, Mukund Ram Shastri, KSTS 21. Bombay, 1918. “Mahtnayaprakta of Arpasthha. In NAK MS 5-358. NGMPP Reel No. B 30/26 (‘Kalulepafcatatal’, Mahinayepraais, ed. K. Sambashiva Shastri, Trivandrum Sanskrit Series 130, Citrodayamafjart 19, Trivandrum, 1837. Matarckananjartparimala of Mahesvarananda with the author's commentary (-primala), ed. Vrajavallabha Dviveds, Yogatantra-Granthamals 5, Varanasi: Research Institute, Varanaseya Sanskrit Vishvavidyalaya, 1972 “Mahesacavidhi, Weongly ascribed to Aghorasivacarya's Kriyakramadyotkt, as its sixth part, but ending with Aghorasivactrya’s Gotrasaritati, Reprinted after resetting by the South India Arcaka Association, 1974, from the anonymous edition printed by Mayilai-Alakappa Madaliyar, Madras (Cintatiripeta) Civatsnapotayantracalai, 1910. Malintjacodrtit of Abhinavagupta, ed. Madhusudan Kaul Shastri, KSTS 31. Seinagar, 1931 Se also Hanneder 1998, “Matintojaytara, ed. Madhusudan Kaul Shastri. KSTS 37. Srinagar, 1922. Manthinadhairaoatantra, Kumardeanda. NGMPP Reel No. A 171/11 Matokgepiramesera, Vidyapada, with the commentary (ort) of Bhatta Ramakantha, ed. NR. Bhat, Publications de IFI 66. Pondichesry: IFI, 1977; Mataigaptramesvardgame, Kriyapada, Yogapada and Carylpad, with the commentary (pt) of Bhatta Ramakantha up to Kriqdplda 11.12b, ed. NAR Bhatt, Publications de VIFI 65, Pondicherry: TFL, 1982. Molgakirta of Sadyojyotis with the commentary (-ortt) of Bhatfa Ramakantha. In Astapratarana, ed Krishnashastri, Devakottai: Sivgamasiddhantaparipslanasangha, 1923. Mgendra: Mrgendratantra, Vidyépada and Yogspada, with the commentary (-ort) of Bhatta Nardyanakantha, ed. Madhusudan Kaul Shastri, KSTS 50. Srinagar, 1990; Mrgendrdgama (Mrgendratantr),Kegapda and incomplete Caryapada, with the commentary (-orti) of Bhatta Narayanakantha, ed. N.R. Bhat. Publications de I1F1 23. Pondicherry: IFL, 1962. Navsvarapartss of Sadyojyotis with the commentary (-prakta) of Bhatia Ramakantha, ed. Madhusudan Kaul Shastri, KSTS 45. Srinagar, 1926.A Commentary on the Opening Verses of Tantrasara 5 [Netratontra with the commentary (Netrodéyota) of Kgemaraja, ed. Madhusudan Kaul Shastri. KSTS 46, 59 Bombay, 1926, 1939 [Nisisarctra. NAK MS 1-1606, Palm-leaf; Newari script, [Niotsaguby, NAK MS 1-227, NGMPP Reel No, A 41/14 (Nisedstattonsaiita,f, 42r5-1L4v, Palm-leat; Nepalese “Liechavi srt: c. ap 900 Nityadsarigrahopaddhti of Rajinaka Takgakavarta, BORI MS. No. 76 of 1875-76 (Bhrigesasahit), Paper; Sarada aramirthstra of Abhinavagupta with the commentary (-vort) of Yogaraja, ed Jagadisha Chandra Chater KSTS 7. Srinagar, 1916 Pantriic withthe commentary (-vivaraya) of Abhinavagupta. (1) See Groli 1985, (2) ed. Mukund Ram Shastri KSTS 18, Srinagar, 1918, Picunats(Brahnayamala). NAK MS 3-370, NGMPP Reel No. A 42/6. Palm-leaf; early Newari script; ap 1052. Pransasartita of Dharmakicti with the author's commentary (soaortt) and the subcommentary (tt) of Karakagomin, ed, Rahula Sérhktyayana, Allahabad: Kitab Mahal, 1943. Reprinted by Rinsen Book Co, Kyoto, 1982 Rawragana, ed. N.R. Bhat, 3 vols. Publications de V1F1 18, Pondicherry: IF, 1961, 1972, and 1988, Sarassattanhabharana of Bhoja, ed, Anundoram Barooah. Gauhati, 1961 Sardhatraitaltara with commentary (-ortti) of Bhatfa Ramakantha, ed. N.R. Bhatt. Publications de 11 61. Pondicherry: IF, 1979. Sarentanotar. NAK MS 1-1693. NGMPP Reel No, A 43/12. Palmleaf; early Nepalese ‘Licehavi script. Salsthasrsahla. See Schoterman 1982. Sioadharmottara, Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, London, Sanskrit MS 5 16 (i), f. 64-143. Paper transcript in Devanagart of a Nepalese palm-leaf manuscript. Sivas of Somsnanda with the commentary (-tiopt) of Utpaladeva (incomplete, up to 474), ed. Madhusudan Kaul Shastri, KSTS 54, Srinagar, 1934 Sivastotrdval of Utpaladeva with the commentary (-vivyti) of Ksemaraja, ed. Rajanaka Laksmana [Lakshman Rainal. Chowkhamba Sanskrit Series 15. Varanasi, 1964. SioasatavmrSnt ed. J.C. Chatter. KSTS 1. Srinagar, 1911 Sivopanse. In Un-Published Upanishads, edited by the Pandits of Adyar Library under the supervision of C. Kunhan Raja. Adyar Library Series 14, Madras: Adyar Library and Research Centre, 1933. Slandapurana: Skandapurdnasya Ambikathendah, ed. Krgnaprasada Bhaltarsl, Mahendraratnagranthamdla 2 Kathmandu: Mahendra Sanskeit University, 1988, See also Adriaensen, Bakker, and H. Isaacson, 1998 Somatambhupaddhati See Brunner 1963-58 Spardenimaya. See Kaul 1925. Spandasaidoa of Kgemardja (commentary on Spandakarika 1.1), ed, Mukund Ram Shastri. KSTS 16, Bombay, 1917. Subkasitvat of Vallabhadeva, ed. R.D. Karmarkar. Bombay Sanskrit and Prakrit Series 31. Bombay, 1961. Reprinted from the 1886 edition of Peter Peterson and Pandit Durgaprasada, Saktimuttvat of fahana, ed. Embar Krishnamacharya. Gaekwad's Oriental Series 31. Baroda: Oriental Institut, 1938. Svabodhodayemanjar' of Vamanadatta, son of Hargadatta, Banaras Hindu University Library, MS C. No. 4255 Swucchandatontra with the commentary (-udéyota) of Keemaraja, ed. Madhusudan Kaul Shastri. KSTS 31, 38, 4, 48,51, 53, 56. Bombay, 1921-36 Soayonbhuswrti, Se Fillizat 1991 Tantrfo of Abhinavagupta with the commentary (-vvela) of Rajanaka Jayaratha, ed. Mukund Ram Shas KSTS 23, 28, 30, 35, 28,41, 47, 59, 52,57, 58. Bombay and Srinagar, 1918-38. Tantrasaithiva, NAK MS 5-445, NGMPP Reel No. A 44/2. Palmleat; early Newari script; ab 1096/97.146 Samarasya Tantrastra of Abhinavagupta, ed. Mukund Ram Shastri. KSTS 17. Bombay, 1938 MSS: C1 = G (Madras, Government Oriental Research Institute and Manuscripts Library, MS No. 177706-B; palm-leaf; Grantha) and P, (BORI No. 145 of 1883-84; paper; Sarada); B = P, (BORI MS No. ‘47 of 1875-76; paper; Sarada) and P, (BORI MS No. 448 of 1675-75; paper; Kashmirian Devandgat}; B, (Banaras Hindu University Library, MS C. No. 31; paper; Sarada); B, (ibid., C. No. 3866; paper: Sarada); Y (Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University, Indic 32; paper, Sad); | Jammu, Shri Raghunatha temple MSS. Library, No. 2333-2334; paper; Kashmirian Devanagar) K, (Keo MS fa); K, (Keo MS fa); K, (Keb MS ga) Toniraatadhanta of Abhinavagupta, ed. Mukund Ram Shastri. KSTS 25. Bombay, 1918 Taniroceye of Abhinavagupta, ed. Raniero Gnoli and Raffaele Torella. In Studi in onore di Luciano Petech, ed. Paolo Daffna, pp. 153-89. Studi Orientali publica dal dipartimento di Studi Oriental 9. Rome University di Roma “La Sapienza”, 1990. Tiniadghttna. NGMPP Reel No. A 35/3, = & 1380/8. Paln-laf; late Nepalese ‘Licchavi' script, Read in a draft of an edition prepared by Dr. Somdev Vasudeva (Oxford) Unmikaulérnava. NAK MS 5-5207 (incomplete). Paper; Newari script. Vanakefoarnata with the commentary (-oarana) of Rajanaka Jayaratha, ed. Madhusudan Kaul Shastri. KSTS 66, Srinagar, 1945. 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