Alper SivaUbiquityConsciousnessSpaciousnessArtfulYogi

HARVEY P. ALPER

SIVA AND THE UBIQUITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS:

THE SPACIOUSNESS OF AN ARTFUL YOGI

The pensive man . . . He sees that eagle float For which the intricate Alps are a single nest.

Wallace Stevens, ‘Connoisseur of Chaos’

everything round invites a caress.

Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics ofSpace

I. INTRODUCTION

(i) setting the scene. It has gradually become clear since their ‘discovery’ late in the last century that the Saiva traditions centered in Kasmir did not become extinct after the Islamic conquest of northern India.’ That they are today of more than historical interest may be seen in their connections with other sorts of Hindu (usually tantric) stfdhunti in north India, especially in the so-called Natha traditions; in their still significant relationship with south Indian agamic Saivism; but most strikingly in the teachings of certain nine- teenth and twentieth century pandits and gurus who have helped revitalize the Saivism of Kasmir, or whom it has in some way influenced.2 A reference to an experience of ‘immersion’ may be found in the work of Gopi Krsna (207), and in this aphorism of the Maharasfrian guru Baba Muktananda (88), who has been instrumental in popularising Kasmiri Saivism,

Bhagawan Sri Nityananda was a perfect Guru. His essential teaching was, “The heart is the hub of all sacred places. Go there and roam in it.”

With this statement we may compare the prefatory verse of the JSA, the fifth chapter of Abhinava’s IPV,

We praise Siva who eternally ilhrmines (prak&zkah) the mass of objects which are immersed in his great heart (mahlfguhrS, secret place, cave) by means of the light of his cognitive power (1.5. intro/lSl: 4-5).3 a

It may be asked: what is meant by immersion in this radiant ocean of consciousness, this heart, and what might a classical Hindu theologian make of it?4 In this paper I shall begin to explore the treatment of this theme in

Journal oflndian Philosophy 7 (1979) 345407.0022-t791/79/0074-0345 $06.30 Copyright 0 1919 by D. Reidel Publishing Co., Dordreeht, Holland, and Boston, U.S.A.

346 HARVEY P. ALPER

the work of Abhinavagupta himself, for he understands the god diva to be ubiquitous, to be that ultimate reality in which both perfected and ordinary persons are constantly and dvnamically immersed.

(ii) The historical context of Abhinavan theology. In early Hinduism, particularly in the Epic (c. 400 B.C.--400 A.D.), Saivism appears primarily as a system of mythology allied with various ritual, meditational, and icono- graphic traditions. During the course of the first millenium A.D. it seems to have undergone a complex reformulation. Reoriented by several new currents of Indian spirituality - e.g., bhakti; tantra, Saktism - Saivism produced a group of non-Vedic scriptures usually known as Agamas. 5 These texts tend to present themselves as the ipsissima verba of Siva himself, and in them Siva is believed to communicate his version of reality to the qualified pupil, typically to his consort, Sri Devi.

In contrast to its distinctive mythology, the available evidence suggests that a uniquely Saivite theology developed slowly, largely in response to the systematic articulation of competing Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain traditions.6 Perhaps the oldest surviving Saivite theology is that of Kaundinya, the commentator on the P&upataszitras, whom Ingalls dates as no later than the fourth century (1962: 284). He, however, offers less an integral exposition of $aivite practices and experience than a redeployment of non-daivite philosophical notions in the service of Saivism (cf. Schulz: 6).

By the last quarter of the first millenium there arose several regional Saivisms which not only drew upon Pura@c and Agamic traditions, but which were sufficiently secure to allow themselves to be influenced in varying ways by the systematization of Hindu and Buddhist thought which followed the work of Dignaga (c. 5th-6th) and Sarpkara (late 7th). Among these regional $aivisms the two most fertile flourished at opposite ends of the Indian subcontinent. One, usually called &tiva SiddhSnta, arose in Tamilnad perhaps as early as the seventh century. The other, with which I am here concerned, arose in KaSmir probably late in the ninth century.’ For the next two hun- dred years, in close dialogue with various Hindu and Buddhist traditions, it produced a remarkable series of liturgical, devotional, and theological works, but with the increasing Islamization of northern India finally fell into silence.* The southern traditions of $aivism, on the other hand, reached mature theological expression later than those of KaSmir, first in Sri Kaptha’s Saivite adaptation of viSi#idvaitaved&zta in the SaivabhrfSya (12th A.D.),

SIVA AND THE UBIQUITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS 347

second in Meykanda’s ,$ivaj&inabodha (first half 13th A.D.).9 Therefore, the theological writing of Kasmiri $aivism occupies a privileged place in the

history of Saivite thought. The work of its major representatives - Somananda

(c. mid-9th A.D.), Utpaladeva (c. early 10th) Abhinavagupta (c. lOOO), and Ksemaraja (c. early 1 Ith) - forms the earliest surviving corpus of Saivite

theological treatises.‘O Beyond this historical priority, the Saivism of Kasmir is also of particular

systematic interest. For a variety of reasons - the many cross-currents of Indian spirituality in the second half of the first millenium, the peculiar

cultural complexity of a border region such as Kasmir, the genius and in- dividuality of its leading representatives - the Saivism of KaSmir developed a rich and suggestive syncretism: not the fusing of discrete historical traditions,

but the fusing of sorts (or structures) of religious life which are often met separately. Here mythic, devotional, and meditative forms of Hinduism

flowed together, interacting with various Hindu and Buddhist philosophies, and (not just in the work of Abhinava) aesthetic speculation. In the end, each contributed to the complex KaSmiri Saiva ideal of the religious hero

(siddha) and each certainly contributed to Abhinava’s correspondingly

complex theological version. In one sense there is nothing new in the Saivism of Kasmir at all. One

could argue that in it no fundamental innovation appears, yet the rearrange- ment of traditional elements is strikingly original. Perhaps the tradition might

be compared to that most Indian of games - chess. As in chess all the pieces

are on the board from the start, the variety of moves is predetermined, yet in the hands of a master breath-taking originality may be achieved. Such, in my

judgment, is the theology of Kasmiri Saivism, at least in the hands of its most brilliant player, the justly renowned Abhinava, for he achieved an original

Saivite theology in which philosophical materials borrowed from various

traditions were integrated in a system which respected Saivite myth and Saivite religious experience.”

(iii) The shape of Abhinavan theology. (a) Problematic. In order to understand Abhinava’s analysis of Siva’s ubiquity, it must be seen in the context

of his general theological endeavor, as well as in the context of KISmiri Saiva theologizing as a whole. In spite of the variety of positions taken within Kasmiri Saivism, from a broad perspective its theology is unequivocal in its central concern: to clarify the meaning and nature of human existence in

348 HARVEY P. ALPER

light of a complex set of experiences which may be identified collectively as

the experience of Siva. Nonetheless, even a cursory examination of the literature, not least of Abhinava’s work, reveals a large and varied vocabulary

that is routinely used to refer to the ultimate.12 The various traditions underlying the Saivism of Kasmir make use of a surfeit of terms for god that are not self-evidently synonomous. Although it is tempting to take it for granted that all these terms are meant to be co-referential to a single (and

simple) religious object, they obviously fall into two classes: those that denominate an individual being (e.g., Siva, Mahesvara, Isvara, and Svamin),

and those that refer to consciousness in one sense or another (e.g., tit, sarpuid, citi, prakda, and vimarsa). An unprejudiced examination of the sources

makes it clear that this division should not be taken as evidence that Abhinava (or other KaSmiri Saiva thinkers) seek - as some have argued (cf. n. 62) - to

substitute an abstract, philosophical ultimate for the personal one of the Saivite tradition. On the contrary, Abhinava employs the metaphor of con-

sciousness with great subtlety in order to unfold as fully as possible the nature of the personal deity Siva in his own complex integrity. One of the

goals of his theology is, therefore, to demonstrate at one and the same time

the diversity of connotation and the actual co-referentiality of the various terms which designate ultimacy. With this as his goal, the Saiva Abhinava sets

himself apart, as he so often does, from the mainstream of the Advaita

Vedanta tradition which progressively came to absolutize the distinction between the ultimate as consciousness (bruhm), and the ultimate as a per-

sonal being (B&ma). This diversity of Kasmiri Saiva religious language needs to be approached

in light of two basic dichotomies that may be found in Hindu speculation

at least as early as the Upanisads (c. 800-500 B.C.). The first is between personalism (i.e., theism) on the one hand and impersonalism on the other. The personalistic current is clearly rooted in the mythic and liturgic life of early Hinduism; the impersonalistic which typically assumes monistic form, seems to reflect the views of an elite whose religious life centered upon reflection and meditation. Within the impersonalistic current there is a second

bifurcation: between a materialistic monism according to which the cosmos evolves through an automatic, mechanistic process, and an idealistic monism according to which it evolves within consciousness by virtue of consciousness’ own volition. Paul Hacker (1961: 11 If.) observes, “There are clear traces of a constant antagonism between theism and impersonalism in the anonymous

!&VA AND THE UBIQUITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS 349

literature from prechristian times to about the 4th or 5th century A.D.,” but from about that time, “ . . . the old opposition between theism and impersonalism was largely replaced by the new antagonism between Saivism and

Vaisnavism.” If, however, one examines the systematic positions taken within the emerging regional Saivisms, particularly that of Kasmir, in the subsequent centuries, one finds that the tension between personalism and impersonalism (as weIl as that between materialistic and idealistic monism) does not simply

vanish: it reappears in a new setting. Thus, in the theologies of the Saivism of

Kasmir we find an elaborate intermingling of personalistic and impersonalistic

elements in a setting which is ultimately personalistic in that it is committed to the experience of the personal deity Siva as the ultimate anchor of the religious life.r3 The study of KaSmiri Saivism thus calls into question any assumption

that myth and theism, on the one hand, and idealism on the other are in-

compatible religious positions. It suggests, on the contrary, that the two may appear as closely related objectifications of man’s chaotic experience

interpreted religiously, that is, as being of ultimate significance. It should, then, be no surprise that these dichotomies may be readily

recognized in Abhinava’s theology. Several of the terms he uses to refer

to the ultimate in themselves seem to take for granted different objects

of religious attention, and seem to imply distinct metaphysical positions. Personalistic terms such as deva or Mahesvara seem to refer without subter-

fuge to the mythic hero of the Saiva tradition, and to imply a dualistic theology which strongly distinguishes the worshipping subject from the

object of worship. The terms tit and saevid seem to refer to consciousness in itself and to imply a strictly non-dualistic idealism. Other terms, which might

also be translated ‘consciousness’ such as citii prakda, and vimarda, however, cannot be facilely classified and suggest the complexity of the idealistic elements in Abhinava’s theology.

(b) Method. In this essay I shall explore Abhinava’s understanding of

the ubiquity of god as consciousness (prakda) by examining his argument against the existence of anything external to illumination (against prakda-

brihy@rthaMda) which is found at IPV 1.5.1-9 in the first half of a chapter dealing with Siva’s ability to cognize (the J&za~akty6hnika). In doing this I

shall particularly attend to the meaning of the term prakda, which may be translated literally as illumination. In the JSA Abhinava treats prakda as a mode of consciousness that is ultimately equivalent both to tit, consciousness

in itself, and to Mahesvara. Hence delimiting the scope of the term prakda is

350 HARVEY P. ALPER

a first step both in reconstructing the idealistic strand of Abhinavan theology, and, ultimately, in deciphering the relationship between the idealistic and mythic metaphors in his religious vision as a whole. In a subsequent study I hope to deal with the second portion of Abhinava’s argument for ubiquity (IPV 1.5.10-21) where he argues that the inspiriting center of phenomena is personal judgment (v~Lw&z), and where, thus, the theology of pruk&z is complemented by a theology of vim&a, complicating and enriching Abhinava’s portrait of god as consciousness.

Here my analysis will fall into two sections. First I shall summarize Abhinava’s case against externality in a straightforward manner, following the JSA’s kdrik5 by k&&i explication as fully as space allows. Second I shall offer an interpretation of Abhinava’s portrait of god as prakda based on this exegesis. In my interpretation I shall focus on the relationship between the theology of prakdu and the theory of Wr&zr&k, seen especially in contrast to the illusionism of Advaita Vedarrta. In this light Abhinava will be seen to understand the ultimate as hw-who-is-prak, that is, as being the ubiquitous, dynamic process of life as such.

I am influenced in this style of analysis by the observation of Ninian Smart that metaphysical assertions are often disguised spiritual claims, and that, therefore, one may not understand a doctrinal scheme without attending to the sometimes complex “religious activities which give [it] life and point” (4, 11, and 13). Smart distinguishes between ‘logical strands’ which are determined by experiential context, and ‘doctrinal schemes’ which not infrequently are based upon several such strands, and which lend them a new doctrinal context. He adds, “the genius of some doctrinal schemes lies precisely in their success in weaving together . . . different strands, even though their epistemological characters are distinct” (15). Abhinava’s genius appears to be precisely of this sort. The mythic and idealistic elements in his synthesis are the two dominant logical strands out of which his doctrinal scheme is woven. In addition - and this must be emphasized - the idealistic strand reveals itself to be a synthesis of several ‘theologies’ of consciousness: the theology of tit, ‘pure’ consciousness as such, and, interpreting it, the complementary theologies of prakda and vimda through which consciousness is focused as the process of coming into existence as world.r4 It is, perhaps, this internal complexity that is the most original element of Abhinava’s idealism, and that distinguishes it from such similar systems as the various sorts of Vedanta and Vijrianavada Buddhism.

fhVA AND THE UBIQUITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS 351

(c) R&urn&. It should be obvious that the success or failure of Abhinava’s

doctrinal scheme finally rests upon the skill with which he weaves together

the various elements of his complex theology. Although it would be premature

to offer a reconstruction of Abhinava’s doctrinal scheme as such, the perspective I have gained on it from this study may be summarized. It seems to me

that Abhinava’s intermingling of theistic-mythic and idealistic models of reality is not merely the artificial grafting of an advaitic monism upon Saiva

personalism because of, for example, the immense prestige of Samkaran

thought. Rather, it is as if in the formation of the &iva traditions of KaSmir the impersonalistic current of early Hindu spirituality had ‘gone underground,’

eventually surfacing as an integral unit of some of the Kabmiri &iva theologies. In Abhinava’s synthesis the personal and impersonal are juxtaposed

in such a way that the latter appears as an outgrowth of the former. This intimate blending of a Saiva theism, with several sorts of Saiva idealism lends

Abhinava’s theology a rich internal texture. In the end, the creative tension seems to allow Abhinava a rare achievement: the forging of a polytheistic theology which recognizes complexity within god, one which has room for

both the reflective and the popular, for yogic abstraction and immersion in the world, and finally - by virtue of the theology of vim&u - one that

focuses the ultimate as fully existent as a multitude of personal agents in the extended, objective universe which is itself also diva.

One must admit that much in Kasmiri Saivism remains obscure, and

I am aware how easy it is to misconstrue the meaning of the texts. I am,

nonetheless, persuaded that Abhinava’s theology is an organic expression of

the Saiva spirit, rooted in a precise, specifiable set of religious experiences, and informed by a vision of ultimacy derived from the classical mythology

of Siva. I realize that I can hardly hope to demonstrate the validity of this conviction in this essay. I shall be satisfied if I can here convey enough of

Abhinava’s integrity so that the reader will no longer be tempted to explain Abhinava away as just a Vedantic wolf in Siva’s skin.

II. ABHINAVA’S CASE AGAINST EXTERNAL OBJECTS

(i) Orientation. The fifth chapter of the IPV is devoted to describing Siva’s ability to cognize @%ina&zkti). In large measure its content is epistemological.

In it Abhinava sets out to account for the fact that there are in reality successful acts of knowing. He does this neither in terms of objectivity, nor

352 HARVEY P. ALPER

subjectivity, nor cognition in itself. Rather he resorts to a transcendental

analysis which attempts to delimit what in fact must be the case about reality as such for successful cognition to be possible. In other words the

solution Abhinava proposes to his epistemological problem is metaphysical. He accounts for the existence of a world characterized by a multiplicity of routinely interacting cognizers, cognitions, and cognitive objects by asserting

that it must be grounded in a ‘pure’, ‘unitary’, personal ultimate, diva, whose nature it is to give rise to cognitive activity.15 Hence the explication of Siva’s agility to cognize focuses on proving (1) that all objects which appear,

appear in Siva, and (2) that their appearance is possible only because Siva is, albeit in a complex, peculiar sense, a personal being.16 One cannot help

but conclude, however, that Abhinava’s argument is less a convincing demonstration of his metaphysics, than a persuasive affirmation of his values.

Fundamentally he desires to defend the axiomatic worth of two, on the

surface, disparate sorts of experience: yogic abstraction and ordinary life. He is determined to assert the priority of the yogic withdrawal of the self into the self (hence of self-consciousness) without jettisoning the value

of ordinary human experience (hence of objectivity). In this sense Abhinava’s

analysis is yet another illustration of the crux of ‘two truths’ which has so exercised VedSntic and Buddhist thought, just as it reflects the dialectic

tension between world affirmation and world reversal at the heart of many

tantric disciplines. As will be seen (II. iii. d), Abhinava - at least in part - attempts to achieve this reconciliation by proposing that one sort of

meditative experience - that of yogic creation - be taken as the model for a dynamic ontology in which being and becoming (and thus the experi-

ences of abstraction from and immersion in an object-field) are seen as fully

integrated. Abhinava’s argument against the existence of objects external to prakdu is

formulated in terms of this twofold axiology. He takes for granted: realism, that is the reality, in some sense of the word, l7 of cognitive objects; pluralism, the multiplicity of subjects and objects; and utility, that subjects and objects are connected in a way that facilitates purposeful action. Any epistemology which failed to account for these characteristics of the cognitive world would

be invalid. In other words, Abhinava wants to defend an ‘ordinary’ view of the world of human transactions (uyavah@~). He rules out of court any theory of knowledge which would, as he puts it, leave the world ‘in the dark’.b At the beginning of the secondaction of the JSIi(k. lo), after asserting


the unbroken continuity of God’s internality, that is, his non-duality’

Abhinava takes pain to defend objectivity:

On the other hand, in regard to objects there is actually externality, namely the judgment of ‘it-ness’ at the very time one has appropriately made the judgment of ‘I-ness’. On one side there is internality, that is, a judgment shaped solely by the delight of consciousness (tit) being utterly ‘I’; on the other side [there is externality, that is] a variety of objects with different characteristics. [Objects] actually do [appear] there can be no question about that! For, if that were not the case, . . ordinary human activities would be thrown into confusion (1.5.10/l%: 12-193: g).r* d

Complementing this commitment to the ordinary Abhinava wishes to show

that real, if penultimate, externality is itself possible only if the whole world

of cognitive transactions, in all its concreteness, comes into existence out of an ultimate reality to which it is intrinsically internal. Because of its nature this ultimate may with equal propriety be called Lord or consciousness. Its

capability to be the home of the world process may be called its ‘divine

sovereignty’ (ui$varya), to employ a theistic metaphor, or its ‘cognitive power’, to employ an epistemic one. l9 At the start Abhinava offers this definition:

The lord’s cognitive power is said to be his illumining @r&i&la) of objects as diverse (Me&) in respect to their dependence upon perceivers [who are] fabricated [through tiyh] - [although ultimately] they are not different (ubhedu) from [his] unlimited (unujjhitu) consciousness (.sut+.f) (1.5.1/154: 4-6).e

Later he recapitulates:

What must be established is the divine sovereignty (ui&rya) of unitary (eku) illumination (yak&a), that is, its ability to manifest @radar~am) the totality of particulars including the relations of cause and effect, and succession and simultaneity (1.5. 4-5/ 163: 12-164: l).f

For Abhinava, then, defending Siva’s ubiquity is a way of celebrating, not of

leveling, the world’s embarrassing complexity.

(ii) Ktirikds 1.5.2-3. (a) Kdrikti 2. Although space precludes a detailed

examination of the give and take of Abhinava’s disputation with various pUrvupzkgzs (opponents), it is convenient to consider the progression of his argument ktirilai by kiriki The essentials of the case against absolute externality are summarized in J&i 2-3. Utpala says:

Unless an object depended intrinsically on illumination @rukddmuta~ it would remain

354 HARVEY P. ALPER

unillumined (uprukdu) as it was previous [to its appearance] . The illumination [of an object] may not be separated (bhinna) [from it]. An object as such (ritmirtha) [participates in] illumination (1.5.2/154: 9-12).

And if illumination were separated [from its object], then there would be a coincidence of objects within undivided (ubhinna) [illumination] . An object is illuminable @rukrSya) [because] it depends essentially on illumination @rukditm~, and without illumination it could not be known to exist (siddhyuti) (IPK 1.5.3/159: 3-6).g

In his commentary on the first of these kdrikas Abhinava sets out to show

that the appearance of objects as external can be validly established.20 He asks himself the question, “What accounts for the appearance of objects to perceivers?” Several possible answers are suggested, but Abhinava rejects all

theories which attempt to explain knowledge by reference merely to the object, the subject or to the fact of cognition on the ground that, in Pandey’s

words, “they present an insurmountable difficulty in bridging the gulf that divides the self from the not-self” (1963: 320f.).21. In contrast to these views

Abhinava holds that it is the nature of objects to appear by virtue of their participation in a reality which transcends them, namely the illuminative

mode of consciousness. He concludes:

Therefore it is in no way to be supposed that a separate illumination is connected to an object, and as a result we logically conclude that an object essentially depends upon being illumined, that is, on not being separate from illumination (1.5.2/158: 4-8).h

In other words, for knowledge to be possible the svatipa of the object must be prakda The object must inhere in an illumination (prak&Mzd SQ [=

urtkak] bkavet, 156: 7) which is not exhausted by its objectivity (i.e., which transcends its object, artk&zrirottir#, 154: 14-155: 1). What in the end

allows appearance to be validly established, and what is thus the most significant characteristic of illumination is not its connection to objects, nor

its transcendence, but its unity. Abhinava argues that if prakada were different (Q~YQ) in each instance of cognition there could be no coordination

(anusa~dkrfna) of discrete acts of cognition, for each prakda would be self- contained (svatmamdtrapalyavuscfna). Since in fact we all take for granted a world which is a web of coordinated acts of cognition (i.e., of ribhtisas) illumination must be unitary (158: 8-12). The question remains: “Of just what kind is this eka eva prakda?” In the remainder of the ISA Abhinava will portray it as that transcendental reality which is the necessary ground of cognitive interaction, a godhead whose perfection is inclusive of, but not exhausted by, its externalized, concrete, dependent world, each particulariza-

SIVA AND THE UBIQUITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS 35.5

tion of which, when ‘liberted’, may be seen as fully sharing its transcendental

perfection. (b) K&&i 3. In his commentary on k. 2 Abhinava argues for a connec-

tion (abhinnatva) between cognitive appearance and consciousness as its illumining ground (‘JwuJ&) and for the unity (ekarva) of this conscio.us ground. In the commentary on k. 3, which complements it, he attempts to

defend the objectivity and multiplicity of the cognitive world (i.e., nilapitayoh

bhedo, 161: 2ff.) without succumbing to a dualism (bhedmG&) which would reintroduce the separation of appearance and prak&. 22 He wants to show

that the unity of consciousness and the diversity of objects connected to it are not only compatible, but mutually necessary, while a dualism that denies

the connection between objects and consciousness would actually entail an unacceptable, and sterile, non-dualism of undifferentiated consciousness.

The k&ikS argues that if there were an essential separation of objects and

illumination there wouuld, as a consequence, be a coinciding of all objects within illumination that would, hence, be non-dual. If one separates objec-

tivity and illumination - that is, if one holds that the svariipa of artha is

bhinna from praktida - one actually sacrifices the very multiplicity one is trying to defend, and gets a confusion of objects in abhinna prakrfSa.

Abhinava, thus, argues that dualism is self-contradictory and leads curiously to its opposite, an absurd, absolute non-dualism:

I f illumination, which is to say, cognition is utterly other (unya) than its object, and consequently unconnected (bhinna) with it, then because in itself illumination is nothing but illumination, it is utterly undivided (ubheda) (1.5.3/160: l-3).i23

The problem facing the dualist is how - given the non-duality of consciousness - to account for the multiplicity of objects without surrendering the separation of object and consciousness after all. Abhinava’s commentary is,

first, (159: 1- 163: 1) devoted to refuting a variety of hypotheses which might be advanced to this purpose .24 He then (163: l-l 1) sums up his

own position that unitary but connected illumination, far from ruling out multiplicity, is precisely that which must be presupposed for it to exist.

This summation reveals how Abhinava shifts in his argument from epis-

temological to metaphysical categories. He has argued that a dualist can’t account for the diversity of the real world by reference to cognition or to

objectivity and that a dualist can’t have recourse to non-dual illumination to account for reality because he would have no way of accounting for its

356 HARVEY P. ALPER

diversity in turn (160: 3-l 63: 1, see n. 24). Having rejected out of hand the

view that only objects exist (i.e., a materialist realism, artha evtfstu, 163: 1)

he concludes:

There is simply no demonstration of [the existence of anything whatsoever] which has not appeared [i.e., apart from illumination, apraluida] for [otherwise] there would hardly be an error if something intrinsically blue [were to be considered] as yellow or as nothing at all (1.5.3./163: 3-S)j

In the end Abhinava finds himself contending that the only guarantor of epistemological accuracy - of ordinary knowledge - is its being fully an

expression of a transcendent consciousness. He supports this by quoting from

another work of his mentor (his paramugunt), Utpala:

In this way these insentient [objects], which are as good as nonexistent (asatknlpa) in themselves, exist (s~ntz~ solely by virtue of illumination; illumination alone exists in and of itself, by means of being that which is other than itself (svupmitma) (1.5.3/163: 6-q.“ 25 ’

He had concluded the commentary on k. 2 in defense of the thesis of unity (eku evu prak&zh, 158: 12); he concludes the commentary on k. 3 in defense of its necessary antithesis: “If there is illumination, then objects exist” @adi

prakxii~ tad3 bhavati arthuh, 163: S), adding:

And how is it that the object is illumination? Since the form of a pot is nothing but its illumination, and [the form] of a cloth is that same [illumination] , it is demonstrated that illumination is the form of the whole world (vi&rvapu~ prakduh) (1.5.3/163: 9-1ij.m

The argument against absolute externality reveals itself as a defense of relative

externality, and a repudiation of absolute monism. Such, in the first instance, is the nature of Siva’s creative ubiquity as prak&z.

(iii) K&&is 1.5.4-9. (a) Summary. In J$A l-9 Abhinava argues that the diversity of cognitive objects (about whose existence there is general

agreement) cannot be explained by reference to the independent existence (sudbhrSva, 1.5. intro/l 5 1.14) of objects external to consciousness, but only by reference to an ultimate power to cognize (jii&Azkti), an ability to

externalize that which is intrinsically internal. In order to demonstrate this he argues in his commentaries on the second and third k&k& that objects by nature inhere in consciousness - that the svabh&a of urtha is prakciia. Now, in order to develop his case further he introduces a rather complex ptirvapaky


(k. 4-5) which attempts to show that one can demonstrate the existence of

real externals by inference. Abhinava responds in his commentary on k. 6-7. There he enunciates his own view that god causes objects to appear

(prak&q~ri, 184: 11; &hrisayati, 185: 2f., etc.) like a yogi without an external, material cause (nintpti&za), and argues that one can’t demonstrate the existence of real externals through perception, since whatever appears to

consciousness is self-evidently not external to it. Then in k. 8-9 he concludes

this section of the IPV by arguing that externals can’t be objects of inference

because inference is based on perception (as is generally acknowledged) and one could hardly infer the existence of anything which has never appeared,

and can never appear. The intrinsic interest of this section as an example of scholastic debate

aside, it is of significance for Abhinava’s ontology in that it makes clear that the purpose of the argument against prak&brlhycirthavada is not to contend

that cognitive objects are unreal, or are illusory phantasms, or even that they lack material concreteness, but that they have no reality independent of consciousness. It is of theological significance for at least two reasons. First,

it offers a portrayal of god as pruktida in terms of ibhtisavrlda, the characterfi- tic causal theory through which Abhinava hazards his solution to the problem

of the one and the many. Second, in it Abhinava interprets the theory of cfbhrfsas analogically with the human experience of yogic creativity.26 n

(b) Ktiriktis 4-5. Even more than in the previous section it is impos-

sible to do justice to the ins and outs of Abhinava’s conversation with the pzPvapuk!a here. Still the argument must be summarized for the light it throws

on his position. K. 4-5, which may be taken to represent a Sautrantika perspective, contend that one may demonstrate through inference the existence of a cause for the diversity of cognitions other than, i.e., external

to, consciousness itself (prakrfSasya vicitrabhave hetvantaram, 164: If.):

Opponent (cet): the seemingly accidental arising of this or that appearance [in cognition] (cTkasmitiMz&) leads one to infer the external object, for undivided consciousness (abhinnusya boddhasya) cannot be the cause (hetu) of diversified appearances (vicitnibhk).

Nor is the diversified awakening of the ‘impressions’ [deposited by previous experiences] (vcrSanu. its cause; for what is the source of the diversity of their awakening in its turn (tusyz)? (IPK 1.5.4-S/164: 11-16.5: 4).0

The exposition of these verses falls into two parts, the first (165: 5-167: 2) a brief r&umC of the Sautrsntika argument, the second (167: 2-176: 5)

358 HARVEY P. ALPER

a rather involved discussion in which the Sautrantika inference of externals is defended by refuting what is taken to be the sole alterantive: the Vijiitia- vida attempt to account for the diversity of cognitions through the theory of vrl~rmti.~~ The second portion of that discussion is, in turn, devoted to a lengthy excursus dealing with the hypothetical inference of ‘other minds’ (169: 4-179:8).

In the first place (16.5:2-l 66:2) the piirvapak~a argues for the undivided nature of cognition (ubhinna bodha) and hence, it seems to be taken for granted by Abhinava, for the unity of consciousness per se, on grounds already familiar from the preceding portions of the JSA. This argument is very brief, and in reality the notion of the non-duality of cognitions seems to be the premise from which the discussion begins. Indeed, it is only because of this conviction that cognition is non-dual (and consciousness, in some sense, one) that accounting for actual cognitive diversity becomes such a peculiar dilemma.2a Thz two interlocutors (and Abhinava) here agree that undivided consciousness, no matter how it is finally understood, cannot in and of itself account for the diveristy of cognitions. The Vijiianavadins attempt to deal with the problem by reference to v&zti, understanding it as the actualizing force (t!akti) of cognition which accounts for the diversity of cognitive forms (the objective content) of cognitions, moment by moment.29 The Sautrantikas respond that this is question-begging, and propose to account for cognitive diversity by reference to reflections @ratibimba) which are themselves the‘ products of imperceptible, but inferable external objects. Finally, Abhinava (k. 6-9) advances the thesis that diversity can most simply (and elegantly) be explained as the spontaneous outpouring of unitary consciousness itself.

The non-duality of consciousness being established, the Sautrantika thesis is summarized:

Undivided consciousness cannot be the cause of diversified appearances [in cognition] (vicitnibhcfsa) . . because a divided effect (kiryabheda) cannot possibly have an undivided cause (hetau abhinne). For this reason the BTrhySrthavZdin supposes that each of these different forms (vicitra . . . nipa) . , . being ephemeral - that is being known to have a cause which is not established through perception - leads one to infer [the existence of] external objects. [Each external object is said:] to effect the expression of its respective nature ~sva.svabh~vasarqxTdako) which amounts to its reflection in consciousness (vij~@nagafapratibirnbdtmaku”), [each] is similar to its own [reflected] form because it is appropriate [for the former to effect the latter], [each] has a multiplicity of different forms which arise successively, [and each] is in every way separate (pthagbhtita) from cognition fjti~na) (1.5.4-S/166:2-167;2). P


The resultant scheme pictures a world of real objects, external to conscious-

ness, whose existence must be inferred in order to account for ordinary

cognitive transactions, even though the objects themselves do not appear.

What one does perceive, according to this view, are not real objects but mere images which are related to them through reflection. It is finally the

reflection of real objects in consciousness - as objects are reflected in a mirror, as the piirvupak;a adds later (1.5%9/185:14-186:5) - that under-

lies the integrity of ordinary cognition. The debate which occupies the remainder of JSA 4-5 allows two sorts of

Buddhist philosophy - Sautrr%ntika ‘realism’ and Vijrianavada ‘idealism’ - to be played off against each other. Abhinava gives the Sautrantikas priority

because it is their acceptance of objects external to consciousness which is

most radically opposed to his own position. The VijrGnavadins are put in the unenviable position of being not quite correct, that is, of recognizing the

priority of consciousness, and denying the independent existence of objects, but for the wrong reasons. Their argument, unlike Abhinava’s, is portrayed as

insufficiently cogent to refute the realist inference of externals. The Sautrantikas observe that v&m& must either be relatively real

(suyvytisat) or ultimately real (pciramcirthika) (cf. Frauwallner, PB: 12Off.). If they are only relatively real they cannot be the cause of anything whatsoever, even of something else relatively real such as appearances in cognition (fibhtisus), for:

It is impossible for the [relatively] unreal (avusru) which characteristically lacks all capability (s&uzrthya) to have a nature which amounts to being capable of producing an effect (1.5.4-S/168:2-4).4

On the other hand, if vdsamis are fully real, as well as separate from con-

sciousness (bodhat . . . bhinna, 168: 5f.), then one must certainly admit that they are after all external objects in everything but name. A third possibility

is that vtisan@s are fully real, but not divided from consciousness. In that

case, consciousness being non-dual (abhinna), they still cannot account for cognitive multiplicity. Irrespective of the status of vrisunti itself, the Sautrarrtikas go on, its awakening (pzbodha), that is, its appearance in

cognition must be entirely unitary (eka eva, 169:3) because it itself doesn’t have a diversified (vicitm) cause.

Finally, the Sautrantikas conclude, one can’t account for a multiple

awakening of v&antis by appeal to other centers of consciousness (svasarg&

360 HARVEY P. ALPER

navartini bodhtinta@i, 169:5) as its cause, since, for various reasons, it is

impossible for there to be distinction within consciousness (bodhavuiluk~mzya, 169:9). That is to say, the very notion of ‘other minds’ makes no sense,

and even if there were multiple centers of consciousness, one still couldn’t

account for cognitive multiplicity because each of them would, implicitly, be self-contained and non-dual all over again30 So the ptirvapaksa concludes

with the refutation of the VijGnavHda position even though it is remarkably

similar to Abhinava’s. From Abhinava’s perspective the error of the VijGna- vadin is not his assertion of ‘consciousness-only’, but his misapprehension of

consciousness, his failure to understand its nature as ultimate, and the process by which it causes the emergence of concrete, cognitive multiplicity.

(c) Kciriktis 6-9. The response to the pzirvapaksa occupies the next section of the J&$(6-9/176:6-191:12). Here Abhinava sets out (1) to

refute the brfhyrfrthmGdin’s inference of externals directly by demonstrating that there can be no valid means of establishing their existence (no slidhaka),

and (2) to demonstrate the nonexistence of externals once and for all, that is, to provide a valid rebuttal (bcidhaka) of it, by pointing out the fundamental incoherence of the idea of there being objects external to consciousness

which, nonetheless, appear. While this response to the panuzpak$a seems formally adequate according to the canons of scholastic argumentation, one cannot help but recognize that Abhinava’s arguments - not unlike those of

the Vijriinavadin piirvapak~a - are, after all, hardly compelling enough to

discredit belief in real externals. The importance of JSA 6-9 is, accordingly, less logical than metaphysical. Abhinava does not display any special argu-

mentative skill in attempting to refute Sautrantika externalism. Rather, he takes the occasion to expound his own theory of ‘phenomena’ or seeming-

ly irreducible ‘appearance-elements’ (tibh&zs).31 This ‘phenomenalism’ (tibh&vtida), which is of much theoretical interest in its own right, is central

to Abhinava’s system - to his epistemology, his ontology, and his theology. This particular sort of phenomenalism helps distinguish Abhinava’s understanding of ultimate consciousness from that of two closely related systems

of idealizing mysticism - Advaita Ved%nta with its theory of ‘illusionism’ (vivartm6da), and Vijnanavada Buddhism with its notions of momentariness, co-dependent origination, and v&znd Abh&zvcida is, moreover, articulated in

a manner which lends it even greater persuasiveness as metaphor than as metaphysical theory.

In terms of the JSA’s discussion of p&&z, which is brought to a close

$IVA AND THE UBIQUITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS 361

with k. 9, the theory of rlbhrfsav&&z must be understood less as of epistemo-

logical than of cosmological significance. By means of cibh&ru&&z Abhinava accounts for the fact that ‘appearance does appear’, and for the complex

quiddity of consciousness: that consciousness is intrinsically objective, that

Siva is in actualization many. Abhcisanidu and the theory of prakcida are, thus, essentially inseparable, and play the role in Abhinavan idealism that the

(various) cosmogonies play in mythic Hinduism.

In expounding the cosmogonic significance of rfbhtisa Abhinava (in k. 7) introduces what may well be the most suggestive idea in his entire discussion

of the ubiquity of god as praktiia - an analogy between the ‘creation’ of objects by god (who is in several different senses consciousness), and the

creation of objects by the meditating yogi. This analogy with the fabrication

of objects in yogic trance is introduced specifically as an alternative to the various theories which interpret the emergence of the universe in terms of reflectionism - in analogy with the appearance of objects in a mirror.

Considering the scope and complexity of Abhinava’s system, one must be cautious in generalizing, nonetheless, from the vantage point of JSA 7 one may say that Abhinava by and large repudiates those theories of appearance

which emphasize the secondary or unreal nature of that which appears, which portray appearances as being no more real than ghostly objects reflected in glass. In contrast Abhinava suggests with his yogic analogy a more organic,

and a more dynamic model of phenomenal appearance which tends to

emphasize the rootedness of appearances in that consciousness which is god.32 In any case, in terms of the argument for Siva’s ubiquity as prak&z the

analogy with yogic fabrication does more than merely set Abhinava’s theory off from various alternatives. It provides an important clue to the class of

personal experiences which, one may hypothesize, are formally objectified in the idea of god’s ubiquity as consciousness. It thus opens up for exami-

nation the social and existential substratum which must underlie even so

rarefied a theological notion as ubiquity. In the remainder of this section I shall summarize the argument of k. 6-9, postponing more systematic

reflection on @bh@sunidu to Section III of this essay. In response to kirikis 4-5 Utpala says:

All right, but since ordinary activity is confined to just these appearances (avabhlfsas), what good isanything else, i.e., external objects, which can’t exist anyhow (IPK 1.5.6/

176:9-177:2)?

For god (deva) who is, without doubt, essentially consciousness (tit) is able to cause the

362 HARVEY P. ALPER

mass of objects which are internal to hhn to appear @ruk&r~et) as external though the power of his volition (icch~vud~7t) hke a yogi, without a material cause [external to consciousness]. (IPK 1.5.7/182:3-6).

The inference [of an object] which has not previously appeared @~ibhitaplSrva) is surely inadmissable. The senses have certainly appeared because entities which are causes (fietuvustu) have appeared, for example, seeds.

There has, however, in no way [previously] been the appearance (ibhisu) [of anything] external to appearance (&h&f~ brlhya)! Therefore, there can be no proof of [the existence of external] objects whatsoever, not even through inference (IPK 1.5.G9/ 186:6-187:2).s

Abhinava summarizes his interpretation of these verses with - for once - admirable brevity:

I f you posit [the existence of] external objects, even by that unsound claim, they serve no purpose [literally: nothing whatsoever may be done with them], for the establishment of ordinary activity is solely through appearances, which you accept, for no ordinary activity whatsoever [may occur] by means of permanent objects of inference; therefore, why [posit] external objects? In their case there is no valid means of establishing their existence while the primary valid means of disproving it is obviously this: if [external objects] are separated from illumination (prukdit bhede) they do not appear even though they may be objects of inference (1.5.6/177:9-178:7).t

In effect this is to say that there is no reason to postulate any reality beyond appearances (&h&zs) because they in themselves provide an accounting for all of reality. To be actual, according to this scheme, is to appear - or, put more literally, to shine forth (bhrl). No amount of logical manipulation can create by means of inference what every sort of human experience - ordinary and extraordinary, waking and sleeping - shows to be nonsensical: realities which are ~JJ de@zition beyond perception. It follows that any object proposed as the cause of cognitive multiplicity - e.g., bti/z~@rha, v&wnd, svalak;ana, paramiyu - will upon investigation turn out to be either nonexistent or within the net of dbhrfsas after a11.33

(d) Kirikci 7. Abhinava’s commentary on k. 7 is the pivotal section of the portion of the IPV with which this essay is concerned, because here the theological vision underlying the argument for god’s ubiquity as consciousness is revealed - focused by an analogy between the divine and the yogic fabrication of objects. This analogy raises several significant problems of interpretation. These problems cannot be wholly resolved here (nor, indeed, without control of Abhinava’s work on the modes of meditation), but the


issues posed may be articulated, and an interpretation consistent with the picture of god as prakrisa contained in J&4 l-9 proposed.

Abhinava interprets Utpala (for the ktirikti see above, p. 355) as concluding

in this verse that the search for a cause of cognitive multiplicity external to

consciousness is unnecessary because there is a simpler and more direct explanation: consciousness itself is ultimate, and has the power to cause

cognitive multiplicity. This power of ultimate consciousness may, moreover, be understood by comparing it to the power of a yogi’s consciousness which

has the power to generate various objects of cognition without the aid of any

cause external to itself. In Abhinava’s own words:

Yogic consciousness (yogisapvid) itself has a power (z?aakti) which is such that it causes the multiplicity of objects to come forth @ruti$uyari) in the form of a variety of appearances (ribhtisus). Therefore, it is my hypothesis that consciousness itself, whose self- dependence (sv&mtrya) is acknowledged, causes the multiplicity of objects which exist entirely internal to it to appear (kbhc5sayati) as external, having the form ‘this’ - because breath, intellect, body, and other [objects] are forms in which consciousness is limited and distributed.34 [Consciousness is capable of doing this] because it is characterized as unobstructed, because of the power of its special volition, and because of the fact that, since it does not have an additional essence [beyond itself], it never disappears. Therefore, in regard to the variety of diverse appearances in the world why shouldn’t one accept the self-dependence of what is absolutely nothing but consciousness (cidrltmana eva) as demonstrated along with its self-awareness (svasarpedanasiddho)? Why torture oneself by taking pains to search for another cause (hetvantura) (1.5.7/184:9-185:6)?u

The crucial point being made in this passage - and one may without difficulty find many like it in Abhinava’s corpus - is that the ultimate must

be characterized simultaneously in three ways: as fundamentally conscious,

self-sufficient, and creative. It is not so much that Abhinava has identified some entity or substance, i.e., ‘consciousness’, as absolute (though one could arguably interpret his work as if he had), as that he has fixed upon a certain

description of the whole process of the life of the cosmos which he has

concluded one cannot verbally better. 3s He says that ultimate consciousness (tit) is primally self-consciousness (svasamvedana), self-dependence

(svtituntrya), a n d potency (bkti). It is as such that he considers it unobstructed (apratigh&), and as possessing a unique power of volition (icchdviJe;a). It is

as such, too, that it may be considered as both one and many. Since it has no

second essence standing alongside it, one must conclude that it is ‘pregnant’ with all things, it cannot disappear (anadhik@tmat8~~ anup&z). The theology of prakda as presented in J& l-9 is an articulation of this one aspect of the

364 HARVEY P. ALPER

complex ultimate nature of the cosmos: the cosmogonic drive of unitary, ubiquitous reality.

It is in order to understand the cosmogonic power of ultimacy that the analogy with-yogic fabrication is introduced. In spite of the difficulties raised, there are three characteristics of yogic cosmogony as Abhinava understands it which make an analogy to divine cosmogony particularly useful to him. First, the creation of objects in yogic trance is ‘special’ rather than ordinary, that is, the objectification of yogic consciousness violates the ordinary law of cause and effect; yogic objects do not have well-known or familiar (prasiddhn) causes. x Second, all of the diverse effects of yogic cognitive multiplicity are held to have a single cause, the yogi’s consciousness. Third, and most significant, in the case of yogic fabrication the multiple effects are not separate from their single cause. They have no existence outside of yogic consciousness.

One problem of interpretation is particularly vexing in regard to this analogy. Does Abhinava believe that there is a material cause (uptidtina) in yogic and divine cosmogony or not? In order to deal with this problem one must return to Utpala’s k&?/c@, and the ptirvapak;u presupposed in JSA 7. Utpala wrote “devo . . . yogiva nirupddtinam arthajdtam prak&ayet.”

At first glance this certainly seems to say that god, like a yogi, causes the manifestation of objects without a material cause. Thus Frauwallner translates:

Denn Gott, der seinem Wesen nach geistig ist, lasst gleich einem Yogin kraft seines

Willens die in ihm befmdlichen GegenstSnde, ohne dass ein materielles Substrat vorhanden w&e, aussen erscheinen ( 196 2 : 3 7).

In his summary of the first udhikcira of the IPK, Frauwallner similarly translated “ohne jede materielle Grundlage” (27). So, too, K. C. Pandey:

That Lord, whose essential nature is sentiency, externally manifests, like a Yogin, all the objects which are within Him, according to His free will, without (requiring) any rnateriai cause (1954: 65).

One can, however, understand the k&z&i to be saying “bogisavvidb~hyam]

niruptidtinam” - “without any other cause,” i.e., “without a cause external to the yogi’s consciousness.” Such is the understanding of Silburn:

Dieu, Conscience par essence, fait, tel un yogin, apparaitre a l’exterieur sans se servir d’aucune cuuse, et par le pouvoir de sa seule volonte, l’ensemble des chases qui resident en lui (MM: 1 18).37

iIVA AND THE UBIQUITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS 365

What is at issue in these diverse translations is clarified by reference to the

arguments of the pUrvapak~~ by and large tacitly presupposed by Abhinava (182: 7- 184:9). The opponent - as usual an externalist - claims that in

analyzing divine or yogic cognition there can be only two possibilities: either the objects of such cognition have no material cause, and are thus unreal (auastu) or they are real, and, as a consequence, must have a material cause, namely real, external atoms.

Abhinava’s answer is that the objects of divine and of yogic creation are

real, but that in both cases unique sorts of causal relationship apply.38

Systematic considerations make clear that from Abhinava’s perspective (as well as from Utpaladeva’s) the correct translation of k. 7 must be “without a material cause [external to consciousness] .” This would seem to leave two

possibilities. Abhinava might hold that divine (or yogic) consciousness is such

that it is the sole - but immaterial - cause of its own objects, or he might hold that consciousness itself is to be understood as the material cause of its

own objectification. It seems to me that while neither of these interpretations are to be dismissed out of hand, the second is by far the more compatible of

the two with Abhinava’s general position. The truth is that Abhinava’s

vision of the cosmic process as ultimate, just like the Vedantin’s analysis of bruhman, tends to undercut any ultimate distinction between an efficient

(nimittu) and a material (up&&r) cause. For Abhinava, as reality is an all- encompassing field of tibhisfsas, so there is ultimately a single cause, and a

single ubiquitous causal process governing the one cosmos. This cosmic

process can be named as god, and as consciousness. It is at once personal and

impersonal. It transcends the ordinary distinctions between subject and object, and mind and matter. Siva-who-is-consciousness who is cause of the

world cannot be ‘described’ as material as opposed to ethereal, or vice versa. He is at once both and neither.

It is in order to establish the special status of the origin of the cosmos that

the analogy between the yogic and the cosmic fabrication of objects is proposed. The point is that as in yogic creation, so in the appearing of the cosmos as such, what appears can be accounted for only by the affirming

of its appearance. Once again metaphysical assertion reveals itself as the assertion of ultimate value reflecting the priority given to certain sorts of

experience. In the case of yoga this affirmation is made by asserting the ‘sovereign power’ of yogis. Then in analogy with yogic experience whose ultimate value is taken for granted the appearance of the cosmos, in all its

366 HARVEY P.ALPER

complexity, is affirmed by asserting the creative self-dependence of Siva- who-is-consciousness. In making this latter affirmation Abhinava is supporting

a complex metaphysical position which he sees as having fidelity to the whole range of human experience, including once again the rather bizarre if

significant experience of yogis! Abhinava’s intention is never unclear: he

wishes to account for real cognitive diversity without positing any ultimate

ontological rupture in the universe. 39 In order to do this he, on the one hand,

affirms the basically personal nature of reality. On the other, he portrays that very reality as a flowing, impersonal matrix in which subjectivity and

objectivity are inextricably bound. In this way he seems to achieve a metaphysics which avoids strict dualism or strict monism, which allows for the sort of ordinary epistemic interaction whose legitimacy he does not wish to

surrender, and which avoids opting for any one unsublatable description of ultimacy.

It appears then, that the yogic analogy stands at the center of Abhinava’s scheme: of his axiology as well as his process ontology. This suggests that

he does not understand it merely as an example which gives some idea of how divine creation, itself inconceivable, might have taken place, but more

earnestly as a model of how Siva - who is, after all, conceived of mythically

as the supreme yogi - in fact constantly creates the cosmos. K. 7 thus point! back, quietly but insistently, to the mythic vision of $iva as one of the most

significant, if perhaps partly subconscious, sources of Abhinavan theology. The yogic analogy reveals, too, that just as Abhinava’s epistemological pro-

blem depends for its solution on a set of metaphysical assertions, so these assertions themselves depend upon a religious validating of human experience,

ordinary and extraordinary.

(e) Ktirikcis 8-9. Let us recapitulate. The whole of Abhinava’s argument has actually been on behalf of one simple claim: external objects that are met

in ordinary cognitions are validly established.40 To understand their validity one must recognize that they are in reality not pure externals but aspects of a complex, ultimate whole. In other words, for multiple, objective appearances

to be valid there must be an intrinsic connection between them and illumining consciousness, which is unitary. There cannot be an ultimate separation between them. Conversely, this is to say that illumining consciousness must necessarily be objective.

As we have seen, in Abhinava’s system epistemology and metaphysics are locked in a tight, religiously affirmed, circle. A realistic and pluralistic


epistemology is underwritten by the ontological claim that unity and objec-

tivity are necessarily concommitants of each other. Abhinava portrays this concommitance through a variety of metaphors. Sometimes he speaks as if

the cosmic process were ‘mechanical’, sometimes as if it were ‘organic’. In the end, however - following out the theology of prakda into that of vim&a, and into that of the mythic figure of $iva -Abhinava feels that it can only be

understood as personal. 41 The model of dynamic personal identity, of person- as-macrocosm, interpreted mythically or abstractly, is the only metaphysical

and theological model fit to account for individual acts of knowing. Only the personal metaphor is sufficiently complex, and sufficiently ambivalent to

describe the facts as man must experience them. For Abhinava, the Saiva, it is solely the person Siva, in his several modes as consciousness, personal and impersonal, who is so spacious as to be able to contain within himself the entire

world of epistemic transactions, in all its sentiency and in all its concreteness.

Abhinava elaborates and defends this complex vision primarily in terms of

rlbhlfsavrfda. Hence from an on the surface entirely common sense realism he is led rather far afield into what might look like a repudiation of just that common sense viewpoint he claims to be defending. He contends that reality

really is made up of ISbh&as. These dbhdsas, however, are not so simple to pin

down. Their occurrence can - under ordinary circumstances - be understood only analogically with the atypical experience of world-imagining yogis, and,

like god and other ‘things-in-themselves’, e.g., atoms, they are, as the phrase goes, notoriously unavailable for empirical examination. Abhinava contends,

moreover, that while people ordinarily think that they perceive nothing but

external objects they are in fact perceiving god as well, albeit in a highly distorted, and eccentric - but not illusory - way, because they have deceived

themselves by means of that conspiracy of language and thought generally known as nUyti.42

Hence to sew up the argument against externals Abhinava, having discussed the yogic analogy in JSA 7, adds nothing substantive to his case in 8-9. He only reformulates from a slightly different perspective his root assertion that

reality is a net of tibhtisas and that the appearance of externals, since it is (speaking strictly) empirically unevidenced, as well as impossible by definition, can hardly be demonstrated even by inference. With this argument the

Siddhantin rests his case against the inference of prak&abcihytirthas by externalists such as the Sautrantikas, as well as his own thesis concerning god’s complex ubiquity.

368 HARVEY P. ALPER

Abhinava’s introduction to k. 8-9 (for the latter see above, p. 362) suggests that he himself recognized that his argument against externals, while plausible, was far from ‘air-tight’. He writes:

[Utpala] anticipates a possible objection: all that having been said (evum) there still happens to be two different hypothetical inferences (sumbhcTvati~urn&t~).~~ Should we conclude (kalpuyema) that the cause of the variety of appearances reflected in cognition ~~~in~praribimbatlibhrlsovaicitrya) is beyond [i.e., separate from] the mirror of consciousness (v~ti~&~rp~~nciririkra), which is in fact to say [a cause] thought to be external to it, in analogy with an [object] such as a pot which is reflected in a mirror? Or, [alternatively], should we say, in analogy to [the fabrication of objects by] a yogi, that nothing other than the self-dependence of consciousness (su~vi~~&z~q~~) is the cause [of the variety of appearances in cognition]? (1.5.8-9/185:14-186:4).x

This passage, besides accentuating Abhinava’s rejection of reflectionist models

of cosmogony,44 indicates that for him the cosmos is a ‘closed shop’, a

self-contained system of appearances. Abhinava’s philosophical objection to externalism comes down to just that it Gould postulate an ontological

openness - a rupture a reality - which he finds unwarranted by human experience. Emotionally speaking he objects to externalism because it would violate his religious vision of reality as a seZf-sufficient whole. Abhinava’s

argument for ubiquity finally stands at the abstract correlate of yogic ex-

perience and Saivite myth. Seen in this light, the argument of J$A 8-9 reveals itself as simple, though

certainly not simple minded. For Abhinava being is becoming; ‘to be’ is ‘to appear’.45 (For the verb ‘appear’ one could substitute ‘shine forth’, ‘be manifested’, ‘pulsate’, or ‘effervesce’ changing only nuance not the substance

of the position.) All technical reasons aside, for this reason alone inferring the existence of something beyond illumining consciousness is unthinkable. Thus Abhinava writes:

It is not only the case that - for the reasons pointed out in previous verses, e.g., because perception amounts to absolutely nothing more than consciousness being self-illumined (svQ~-Q~E~QsQ~@~~~~Q) so that, for example, a blue object shines forth (bh&) - external objects do not appear in perception. It is also the case that external objects are not established even by inference (1.5.8-g/187:3-7).y

He explains:

In regard to the establishing of external objects inference cannot possibly come into play. Even if it did come into play, it could not lead to establishing [the existence of external objects] which is being discussed . . . . Inference is a predicative cognition


(vikolpa) and it is recognized that every predicative cognition is rooted in perception. Therefore, in the case of something which has ln no way previously appeared, i.e., has not been perceived, an inference, that is to say, an inferential conclusion (unumitivyrlpcira) which is predicative cannot be accepted by any philosopher (1.5.8-g/187:8-15).2

Abhinava’s taking for granted that inference is predicative (i.e., determinate, conceptual, verbal) and dependent upon perception is, especially in light of

the influence of the School of Dignaga on his work, neither surprising nor

exceptionable. Therefore, he feels free, after dealing with only one potential objection (187: 15-191:4),46 to move directly to the peroration of JSA l-9. In his own words:

Therefore, lf a blue or another object is not reached (i.e., penentrated, omzvk[a) by an illumining cognition @ruti&z), even one that is inferential. and predicative, then it certainly may not be inferred. Were it to be reached by [such a cognition] after all, then it would in fact really be nothing but illumination @mk&m&usvabh~vu), it would not be external, because of the principle [stated in k. 21: “[Unless an object depended intrinsically on illumination] it would remain unillumined as it was previous [to its appearance] .”

Therefore, whatever proof @ruti~a) is proposed to demonstrate [the existence of] external objects is, in fact, self-contradictory, for it conversely demonstrates their non- externality (1.5.8-g/191:4-ll).aa

This is not the place to provide a critical evaluation of Abhinava’s case

against externality and for god’s complex ubiquity. Its status in situ can,

however, be summarized. There can be little doubt that Abhinava in the JSA, as in the rest of his philosophical writing, displays wide familiarity with the Indian scholastic tradition, Hindu and Buddhist, and control of the accepted

techniques of argumentation. His conclusion, nonetheless, must be judged persuasive rather than convincing. Whom will Abhinava persuade? Those who

share - or through personal reorientation come to share - his vision of reality as being a diverse whole which is itself the ultimate object of religious

awe and celebration. The evidence suggests that, sectarian and social considerations aside, this vision might persuade many. In spite of the attention

lavished on Advaita Ved%nta both inside and outside of India in recent

centuries, the tradition of bhedcibheda - of the universe as luminous whole, as ‘full pot’, as that single set which contains an infinite supply of desirables - seems to be something like the central, even normative, vision of the Hindu

world, both in its reflection, and in its folk manifestations (cf. Pensa: 108- 114). Those with less taste for either the mythical or the metaphysical, and a

370 HARVEY P. ALPER

more discriminating eye for philosophical sleight of hand might argue that

Abhinava’s case against externals is little more than an elaborate unpacking of his assumptions, themselves unargued, about prak&z/&zE~u. This would

have little disuasive impact. Abhinavans could respond: perhaps, if the universe is the complex whole we have described, such an incestuous, but

productive vision is rather the best that can be done.

III.GOD AS PRAKzidA

(i) Orientation. The previous section of this essay (II) was largely exegetical.

In it I sought to set out, insofar as I was able, precisely what Abhinava had to say in J$A l-9 about Siva’s ubiquity as pr&i&z. In this section I wish to complement my exegesis by exploring some of the systematic and imaginal

implications and presuppositions of Abhinava’s argument, recognizing that my attending to them has already helped shape my exegesis. #at I venture is an - I hope responsible - reconstruction not of what Abhinava said, but

of what he might have felt about what he said, and thus of the reasons behind

his saying it. In this endeavor there is, to be sure, considerable hermeneutic risk. My suggestions go beyond the text of J&4 l-9 per se, and the state of

Abhinavan scholarship makes it impossible to demonstrate their validity by marshalling a representative sample of (clear and comprehensible) proof texts

from the whole range of Abhinava’s dense and intricate corpus. Furthermore, my suggestions are informed not just by Abhinava’s work, but by the move-

ment of my own sensibility in response to his probing, polyvalent theology.

To interpret any aspect of Abhinava’s theology judiciously requires that one situate the exposition of text passages by means of an imaginative re-

creation of their historical context, of that systemic and experiential situation which provided Abhinava’s point of departure, and to whose fears, hopes, and

assumptions his theology spoke. It is certainly not simple to perform such a task of re-imagining, for Abhinava’s theology is at once scholastic and tantric, as well as alive to aesthetic and linguistic nuances which are only occasionally

made explicit. Hence my reflections on the context and significance of the theology of prakdu are obviously tentative. My goal is to draw out of the texts various layers of meaning, thereby broadening the scope of the discussion of Abhinava’s and other theologies of northern Saivism. I shall focus here on a single problem of interpretation: the understanding of pm&&z in terms of cfbhcisanidu as a theology of cosmogonic process. I recognize, of

!hVA AND THE UBIQUITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS 371

course, that this is only one of a number of issues raised by Abhinava’s portrayal of god as prukda. Only as a means of drawing the entire discussion to a close shall I allude to some of these additional lines of interpretation.

(ii>; Prakti$a and tibh&vrfda. (a) Background. Abh&zvlida is the theory by

which Abhinava attempts to explain the manifestation of the ‘ordinary’ from, and its relationship to, the ultimate. It provides a general theory of relation-

ships - for short, a ‘causal’ theory - which is articulated in terms of a variety of overlapping models, root metaphors, and analogies (cf. Potter: 172). As

one would expect it serves both as a cosmogonic theory, as an epistemology (accounting for correct cognitions), and ultimately - of great importance for Hindu gnosis from the time of the Upanisads - also as a theory of error

(accounting for erroneous cognitions). In the end it shall have to be under-

stood against the background of alternative Kasmiri Saiva theories having

similar functions which are themselves incorporated into Abhinava’s complex

theology, in particular the theory of spanda (vibration or movement), and the theory of the progressive evolution of V&Y (utterance) (on the latter see

Padoux, 1963 and 1975 and Gnoli, 1959a, 1959b, and 1965). In addition it must be understood against the alternatives proposed by competing traditions,

especially Advaita Vedanta and Vijrianavada Buddhism. For the sake of clarity and convenience I shall here examine Cbhrfsuvtidu largely in terms of

the well-known Ved%ntic theories of pu?i@mav~da and vivartavtida, being guided by the discussion of those theories in Paul Hacker’s monograph

Vivarta.47 I shall, further, focus heavily on the cosmogonic function of tibhrfsavtida because that highlights the special character of the theology of

prak3da. As has been indicated above (see II. iii. c) the theory of abhrZr;as is integral

to Abhinava’s exposition of the ubiquity of prak&z. It is presented as an alternative to any sort of realism which accepts the existence of objects

external to consciousness, and, in connection with Abhinava’s yogic analogy, as an alternative model to any sort of reflectionism; that is, an alternative

to a realistic reflectionism such as that of the Sautrantikas discussed above, and to an illusionistic reflectionism such as is advocated in some sorts of Vijrianavada Buddhism and Advaita Vedanta.

What, however, is the ontological status of each ‘cognitive appearance’?

Should one understand an tibh&sa as ultimately illusory, a mere appearance, or as in some sense ultimately real, as a projected form of ultimate reality?

372 HARVEY P. ALPER

In answering this question historically and systematically it is natural to compare @bh&savidu with the two allied Vedantic theories of pari@mavtida

and vivartavada. In making this comparison one must not lose sight of the complexity of the Vedantic tradition. In the first place, the ‘self-non-dualism’

(&tidvaitu) of G au d apada and his successors was only one of several sorts of Vedanta. Alongside it there was the ‘word-non-dualism’ (kzbdcjdvaita) of

BhartIhari (late 5th) who is one of the figures - another is Dharmakirti - with

whom Abhinava is most familiar, and whose theories had a signal influence

on his work. In contrast to both of those non-dualisms there were the too often neglected, but fundamental Vedarrtic tradition of bhedebheda (or dvaittidvaita) which attempted to mediate between dualism and non-dualism.

It was represented by Bhartrpraparica (6th?) and Bhaskara (8th). Whatever

the historical relationship, if any, the study of Abhinava makes it apparent that there are important structural similarities between Bhedabheda Vediinta

and the various theologies of northern Saivism.48 Secondly, the advuitu tradition of Samkara and his followers had up to and including the time of Abhinava a more flexible character than it later assumed. What came to be

accepted as the ‘normative’ causal theories, and thus the ‘classical’ illusionism, of Advaita VedFtnta were still at that time in the process of developing. Each

major advaitic theorist - some half dozen figures from say Samkara in the late seventh century through Vacaspatimisra in the tenth - offered his own

sometimes highly individualistic understanding of the relations between brahman, avidyd (nescience), My@, and the world of objective multiplicity.4g

Here I wish to point out some of the more salient features of Abhinava’s

position, seen in contrast to the advaitism of the centuries preceding him

in general. Obviously my observations can hardly be complete; they are intended to highlight an area meriting considerable scholarly investigation.

Before proceeding it might be helpful to summarize (largely following

Hacker, 1953: 189-194) the meaning of par&iinavtsda and vivartavddu, and how they came to be used in Vedantic theology. Basically they are causal theories applicable to the question of how brahman might have been the

cause of cosmic manifestation. Pari~rimavrlda, accepted by Samkhya, and early Vedanta, as well as by Bhedabheda-, and Visisfadvaita Ved%nta, emphasizes the essential identity of a material cause and its effects and holds

that an effect is the real ‘transformation’ of its material cause, just as curdled milk is nothing but another state of milk. According to this view, change takes place on a single level of reality: the effect is as real as its material


cause. Vivartav@da is, in contrast, the theory that evolved as the advaita

tradition moved towards the adoption of illusionism. It emphasizes the

ontological discontinuity between cause and effect, and holds that an effect is only the ‘apparent manifestation’ of its material cause, just as a stick may

appear to be, but in reality is not, a snake. According to this view, change is a movement from a higher level (the truly real, satya) to a lower level

(the not truly real, asatya) of reality: the effect can have no independent existence.50

Certain aspects of these theories merit attention. Both allow brahman to

be identified as at once the efficient (nimitta) and material (uprfdrfna) cause of the world. As Hacker expresses it (190): “der Allgott oder das Absolutum

ist zugleich Schopfer und Urstoff der Welt.” Both intend to be fundamentally non-dualistic (or one may fairly say monistic), but they diverge radically in their treatment of non-dualism. Pari@zuvrida, taking its monism straight-

forwardly tends to minimize the distinction between consciousness and

matter. Vivartavddu, on the other hand, precisely to protect the purity of its monism strictly distinguishes consciousness and matter. In its view brahrnan

must be left absolutely unmoved by the movement of the cosmos. This strictness, however, tends to have the unwanted consequence of reimporting

dualism in defense of monism - as Abhinava takes glee in pointing out

(compare above II. ii). It is in order to cope with this ‘second-order’ dualism that the advaita tradition evolves ineluctably toward illusionism.51

Hence there eventually emerges various individual variations of this scheme

(Hacker: 191):

Der Advaitin kennt mu ein wahrhaft Seiendes: das Brahman, und zum Wesen dieses Seienden geh&t es, nur zu sein und nicht werden zu k&men. Daraus folgt erstens, dass innerhalb seiner Sphtie kein Pari$ma mijglich ist, dass also jeder Par@ma ganz in Bereich des Nichtwahrhaftseienden oder Unbestimmbaren geschenen muss.

To bridge the gap between being and becoming the allied concepts of tiyti and avidyti are invoked. By virtue of a peculiar and virtually undefinable

relationship (i.e., vivartavrida) m@y@zvidy@ is held to be integral to brahman, while the world of multiplicity is held to stand in a pari@ma- relationship to mriyi/avidyti. “Die Maya als Urstoff und die Welt als Produkt gehoren ja demselben ontologischen Bereich an, innerhalb dessen die Parinama- Beziehung statthaben kann” (192). In other words advaitism reaches the

formulation that the world is vivarta of brahman, but pari@ma of rnbya, or,

374 HARVEY P. ALPER

to use an epistemological model, that the snake is vivarta of the stick, but paripcima of avidya.

(b) AbhrssavtIda as dialectical. On the basis of the argument against externals outlined above the reader should now be able to imagine where

Abhinava wants to position himself in this discussion. He wants to hold (with pari@mavEda) that the evolution of the cosmos is a real transformation

taking place wholly within a single reality. At the same time he wants to hold (with vivartavtida, but without its illusionism) that this real process of

transformation represents a progressive decline in level of reality from the, as

it were, most real to the least real. Abh&zvtida is his attempt to devise a causal theory which will allow him to achieve this reconciliation. It seems to

me that it is formulated not only in terms of the scholastic distinctions I have been discussing, but also with an eye to Abhinava’s particular understanding

of liberation as Jivanmukti, and to the meditative and tantric practices believed

to lead to it. Hence the importance of the yogic analogy outlined above (II. iii. d). This analogy provides a, if not the, primary model in whose terms

cfbh&v&da is understood. According to it change (i.e., the emergence of the

cosmos) is like the arising of a real world of cognitive appearances within the single, comprehensive reality who is the meditating yogi. This model

allows Abhinava to preserve the systematic and practical advantages of both

paribtima and vivartavtida: it pictures the ultimate as the single horizon within whose bounds real, but relative, distinctions arise.

The argument of JSA l-9 shows that Abhinava is fundamentally determined to avoid the absurdity of any position which, were it true, would entail

the nonexistence (or unreality) of cognitional activity (i.e., ‘difference’), or even - I think it is arguable - its ultimate religious devaluation. Therefore his

discussion of praktida’s ubiquity (i.e., ‘identity’) in the end comes down to a peculiarly dialectical defense of the relative autonomy of the cognitive object. Abhlisavtfda is at once the cosmological and epistemological articulation of this dialectic designed to protect both the discrete integrity and the

inseparability of ultimate and penultimate reality. The dialectic nature of tibh&zvtida merits emphasis. For Abhinava, in

agreement with most forms of Saivism and Vedanta, the ultimate is at once the efficient and the material cause of the phenomenally manifested world. In accordance with sdtk&vavtida, ribh&avtfda, and the yogic analogy Abhinaa holds that the manifested world is secondary in the sense that it is merely an

effect, but at the same time he holds that it is no less than a projection5* or


form (tipa, vupus), - to use a more abstract term a ‘cognitive concretization’

- of the ultimate. Thus for him there cannot be an absolute distinction between consciousness and matter, subject and object, cause and effect, or

between the elements of any relationship whatsoever. Relationship as such is

‘internal’ to, i.e., intrinsic to, ultimacy. It seems to me that virtually every page of the IPV testifies to Abhinava’s conviction on this - in itself hardly

original - point. What distinguishes Abhinava’s scheme is the subtle and methodical working out of these theses in the service of the Saiva vision of

reality. For Abhinava as a Saiva ‘in good standing’ it is of the nature of the

ultimate not merely to be - that would be insufferably boring! - but to become. Indeed, it is precisely the nature of its becoming, the perfection

of its self-limitation which makes the ultimate ultimate. This fact lends

multiplicity (and thus prak&z) a rather complex ontological status. On the

one hand each effect, that is to say each cognitive objectification or @bh&sa, is in itself lacking in self-dependence (lacking in Wtantrya); it is dependent

on others (par&znOya). 53 At the same time the totality of effects, taken as

a whole, is believed to exist necessarily. Philosophical and practical religiosity here coincide. An ultimate wholly lacking in cognitive activity (and hence objectivity) is unthinkable, for then god would not be that complex object of

religious interest in whom one fully participates, but would be of no more interest than a bump on a log. As Abhinava says, “yadi pruk&zh tadi bhavati arthah (see above, p. 347). Abh&&da then seems to assert a metaphysics which can most accurately be called bhedcbheda.. According to it there is at

one and the same time real ontological continuity and real ontological dis-

continuity between Siva-who-is-consciousness and the world. Identity and difference are seen to subsist within each other, although it is usually identity which is given poetic pride of place.

(c) Prak&a es Cosmogonic. What then is the relationship between the notion of prak&z and clbh@sav&da Praktia, it seems to me, is simply that

mode of the ultimate which accounts for the actualization of the multiplicity

of objects, it is that without which there would in fact be no establishment of the relative independence, that is, the cognitive identity, of objects. Thus it is simply said: “The establishing of objects is effected by illumination”

(prak&zbal@t bhrlvavyavasthlf) (1.5 .17/2 17: 1 2).s4 Here cosmology and epistemology work together. The argument against absolute externals is certainly epistemological, yet the theory of prak& basically assumes the

376 HARVEY P. ALPER

role of a cosmogonic theory - albeit a highly impersonal and non-mythical

one. As such prak&a focuses ultimacy precisely as the constant becoming of that world within whose bounds epistemic interaction alone takes place. As

such its own polyvalence is revealed: while ultimately identical to the subject, to Siva, to tit, as cosmogonic praMa serves as that impersonal prime ‘matter’

out of which and within which multiplicity is chiseled.ss As such, too, the

‘incompleteness’ of the theology of prakada is manifest; its calling forth a complementary personal (subjective) idealism, the theology of ‘judgment’,

vim&a. One does not get the impression - in J$A l-9 or elsewhere - that

Abhinava has an easy time delimiting prakdda in either cosmogonic or epi- temological terms. In describing it he strives to occupy the ‘middle ground’

between a strict non-dualism and a strict dualism, The closeness of his position

to both may account for the lengths to which he has to go to establish relative externality while refuting absolute externality. For example, in

J$A 15.3 a pOrvapak;a suggests that “the distinction between blue and

yellow [i.e., between different objects] should be accepted as effected by illumination” (iha prakddabahit nilapitayoh bhedo ‘bhyupagantavyah) (1.5.31

161: 2-3). Abhinava rejects this on the grounds that the pzIrvapak;a simul-

taneously asserts the radical non-duality of prakda - its being undivided (abheda), and separated (bhinna) from appearance (see above II. ii). If,

however, one substitutes a dialectic understanding of non-duality for an absolute one, the pr.IrvapakSa turns out to be giving precise expression to

Abhinava’s position after all: prak&a is at one and the same time ultimately unitary, potentially objectifiable, and actually objective! s6

(d) npological observations. Assuming that my interpretation is broadly

correct, I go on to make a few historical-philosophical observations about the theology of prak&a - which might better now be called the theology of

prak&a/5bh&a - and to point out some of the historical- religious implications of viewing Abhinava not as some sort of third-string Samkaran but as a dialectical, ‘identity-in-difference’ Saiva.

Abhinava begins his analysis of objects external to consciousness with the assumption that real objects in some sense participate in a reality which is greater than they are. What finally is the nature of this reality which may be identified by so many different terms? I see no reason to conclude that Abhinava was of one mind on this question. One easily notices a variety of emphases in his work, and this suggests both a real ambivalence on his part

!hVA AND THE UBIQUITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS 377

and perhaps the evolving of his position during the course of his career.57

I want to suggest that up to a certain point - that is, insofar as it did not go beyond the bounds of the medieval Brahmanic/$aiva world - Abhinava

not only tolerated, but expected and welcomed ambivalence. The theology of pruiWu/&z&r~ (in conjunction, of course, with the other strands of Abhinava’s idealism, and with the mythic strand of his theology) points, I

believe, to the fundamentally dynamic and polyvalent thrust of Abhinava’s understanding.

If one considers one side of Abhinava’s idealism - the theology of tit or

samvid, consciousness as such - in itself, one would be tempted to say that Abhinava pictures that in - and out of - which the world emerges as a

supreme substance. , 58 If on the other hand, one considers another side of his idealism - the theology of vima& (judgment, hence volition) and dtmun -

in itself, one could get the impression that Abhinava pictures the ultimate as

the supreme subject. The theology of pruk&%z/Ebh~sa - still a third strand of Abhinava’s idealism -points the way to a more comprehensive understanding,

one which is in accord with both the mythology of Siva and the dialectical

soteriology of Saivite tantra: for Abhinava the ultimate is the life process in its awesome (but hardly ineffable) totality.

While the tantric influence on Abhinava’s metaphysics may make it appear rather ‘baroque’ in comparison to the somewhat more familiar metaphysics of

Vedanta, it is important to recognize that Abhinava is dealing essentially with the same problematic that has plagued Ved%nta (and in a somewhat different

way Buddhism, too) for centuries. Therefore, it should not be surprising that

his scheme turns out to be broadly parallel to that of several Vedantavadins usually seen as arch-opponents of each other. Like Bhartrhari (the fifth

century $abd@dvaitin), like Samkara (the seventh century dttidvaitin), and like Bhaskara (the eighth century dvaitlidvaitin) Abhinava may be understood

as teaching a qualified - even if a highly qualified - parigimavdda. (That in the first instance is what tibh&zvtida amounts to.) What distinguishes the

theories of these four figures is the degree and direction of the qualification. That is clearly determined not only by considerations of logic, but by practical religious differences, and even by temperament.

Samkara, as Hacker (1953: 210f.) has shown;moves toward illusionism: “!&nkaras kosmologie ist eine Art illusionistischer Pariyimavllda. Das heisst:

Er behalt die Begriffe der altvedantischen, realistischen Emanationslehre bei, fiigt ihnen aber immer wieder illusionistische Gedanken hinzu.” Although

378 HARVEY P. ALPER

there are passages one might cite to support the opposite position, I believe that basically Abhinava does not follow $arpkara and his tradition in this direction. He stands systematically and temperamentally far closer to

Bhartrhari and Bhaskara, whose schemes themselves show real similarity.59 Both Bhartrhari’s IGi@q&@z (VP) and the commentary (vrtti) on it certain-

ly incorporate an element of illusionism. Nonetheless, as Hacker (199) observes about the VP, Bhartrhari persists, in distinction from later advaitism,

in asserting the identity of appearance and being. Hence, Hacker (200) notes:

. . . [Bhartrhari] belasst das Absolutum in einer gewissen Vermengung mit der Welt - ganz 3nrlich wie es die nichtillusionistische Vedanta-Theorie der ‘Einheit in der Unterschiedlichkeit’ (bhed2#redav&) getan hatte . . . . Man konnte Bhartrharis Stand- punkt als illusionistischen Bhedabhedavdda charakterisieren: das Absolutum ist flir ihn realiter identisch mit seinen scheinbaren Entfaltungen und zugleich scheinbar von ihnen verschieden.60

What distinguishes Abhinava’s position from either dabdddvaita or dvaitad-

vaita? Certain details of his cosmology and metaphysics aside - the nature of his Lakti theory, the use he makes of the samkhyan scheme of emanation -

one above all else notices a fundamental difference in tone and in emphasis.

What Abhinava constructs is not after all an illusionistic paricrimavrida. He emphasizes neither the illusory nor the substantialist ‘lessons’ which might

easily be seen as implicit in the theory of #bh&as and the yogic model. On the contrary, he highlights throughout the constant dynamic of world

emergence and subsidence, the complex process which is Siva as itself being ultimate. It is the inclusive spontaneity of the cosmic happening - call it what you will - which is self-dependent. It is this process which is Siva-who- is-consciousness in all its modalities, including that of prak&a, the ‘power of

consciousness’ @@zaSakti) to create itself as world. Over against the self- monism of mainstream advaita, over against the word-monism of Bhartrhari,

over against the simple identity-in-difference monism of Bhaskara, Abhinava postulates a more comprehensive and multi-faceted alternative: a theology of constant movement that might be called a Saiva ‘monism’ of cosmic process.

(e) Prakdda as an essentially qualified ultimate. As has been pointed out by Hacker and Potter (among others) there is a telling argument against any sort of Bhedabheda VedWa, or even more broadly against par@imavtida. Thus Potter (156) speaking of Bhartrpraparica:

Since the transformation of Brahman into selves is a real transformation (cause and


effect are equally real), and since the attachment of the selves to habits is a real attachment, one must conclude that Brahman is itself infected with the very evils of bondage which infect its constituent factors, since they preexist in Brahman. Really to crush all those evils which constitute bondage, one must crush a part at least of Brahman itself. The difficulty stems. . . from the fact that the transformation relation is too strong (or so the critic argues): to break such a relationship, one must destroy both of its terms.

This being the case Vedtita would be compelled to adopt illusionism: “The

point of introducing vivarta in place of pari@ma [is] . . . to avoid visiting the

stable relatum in a dependence relation with the defects of the unstable one” (Potter 162).

Hacker (1953: 200) elaborates much the same point in considering Bhartlhari:

Bhartlhari’s Illusionismus leistet also nicht das, was eigentlich seine Funktion sein sol&e: nlmlich das Absolutum wirklich als unvertiderliches, unberiihrtes, ruhendes Sein zu erweisen.

He goes on to observe:

Mit der Unklarheit der ontologischen Grundlegung h%ngt es zusammen, dass BhartIhari es such nicht fiir n6jtig h&, den Begriff der illusorischen Entwicklung von dem der normalen Entwicklung zu differenzieren. Die Systematiker entdeckten spCter, das man zwischen solcher Entwicklung, die innerhalb des niederen Seinsbereiches verlguft, und solcher, die von der hijheren Stufe zur niederen fiihrt, unterscheiden m&e: erstere ist Pari+ma, letztere Vivarta.

Hacker (226f.) sharpens his portrait of this dilemma by citing a criticism of

Bhartrhari offered by Vimuktatman (10th) in his Igasiddhi. 61 He summarizes:

Vimuktatman . macht also deutlich, dass es notwendig ist, mit dem Weder-noch vollen Ernst zu machen, wenn die Vivarta-Lehre logisch haltbar sein ~011: die Beziehung des ‘Fiktiver’, d.h. des WederSeienden-noch-Nichtseienden, zum Realen kann nicht, wie BhartFhari will, Identitlt sein; sie kann aber ebensowenig . . . Verschiedenheit oder Sowohl-Verschiedenheit-als-such-Identitat sein; sie kann ihrerseits such nur durch die Weder-noch-Formel beschrieben werden - sie muss ‘unbestimmbar’ sein. Abschliessend definiert Vimuktstman das Vertiltnis des Absolutums zur Welt. Er behtiilt dabei die Begriffe des Fiktiven und des Substrates bei; nur der Begriff der Identitlt ist ausgemerzt und durch das ‘Weder identisch noch verschieden noch beides zugleich’ ersetzt.

In assessing these criticisms - which could equally well be directed against Abhinava as against Bhartlprapafica and Bhaskara - and in imagining how Abhinava might respond to them it is important to recognize that they

happen to depend upon a single religious assumption - which is explicit in

380 HARVEY P.ALPER

the position of Vimuktatman, rather more tacit in the case of Hacker and

Potter. It is the assumption that the optimum characterization of the ultimate

(brahman) must be as unchanging, untouched, and unmoved; as perfectly uninvolved with the cognitive world. This assumption, however, is rooted in

none other than the religious vision of illusionistic advaita and in the practice

of a certain sort of yoga designed essentially - no matter with what

terminological subtley it is expressed - to extricate (or abstract) consciousness from the taint of embodiment, embodiment being accurately enough recognized as implying activity and death. If belief in the necessity or plau-

sability of this assumption is shaken, then this criticism of bhedbbheda might be seen to lose much of its sting.

Abhinava - in spite of the many ways in which he is indebted to the schools

of Mahayana Buddhism and Ved;Inta - clearly takes for granted a different point of departure: the mythic vision of diva and the sort of dialectical yoga

which may be called tantric. For tantric gaivism, in distinction from Ved5nta and classical yoga, the central problematic of man’s spiritual life is that of properly recognizing and personally affirming the at once daunting and en-

chanting constant dynamic inextricability of spirit and matter, of creation and

destruction, of life and death - on all levels of reality. With such a point of departure we may imagine Abhinava’s response. He

would certainly have to admit the logical force of the Vivartavadin’s critique: any sort of qualified or contextual advaita, any sort of bhedribheda finally

means that an ultimate distinction between substratum and error is fatally compromised. To this, however, he could respond that it is just what the

advaitin finds systematically wanting - a qualified ultimate - that is of the greatest religious utility. In other words he could argue that illusionism does

not connect the ultimate and the apparent world with sufficient coherence

to allow one to make sense out of the actual religious practices (the path) one follows in order to obtain liberation while alive. The formal consistency of vivartav&da and classical yoga would then be seen as a religious liability.

As a tantric Saiva Abhinava could offer a radical alternative, admitting, first of all, that mutability is in one sense of the essence of the ultimate, that what characterizes the world, in that sense also characterizes Siva-who-is- consciousness. It seems to me that such an affirmation (or ‘concession’, if

one prefers) is indeed implicit in the discussion of prak’da’s ubiquity that I have examined. It is certainly consistent with the mythology of Siva: what after all is god as praktida, the ultimate as in one sense objective, but the


abstract correlate of the dancing Siva, he who is necessarily perfect in his

imperfection?

IV. CONCLUSION

My analysis of Abhinava’s argument against the existence of objects external to

prakrlsa and of the theory of &rtius related to it is preliminary. As more of Abhinava’s philosophical writings are made the object of detailed scholarly examination, it shall require rethinking and refining. I am persuaded, how-

ever, that the material I have discussed discloses something of the nature of Abhinava’s theological position in general. Therefore, in summary and conclusion, I feel able to offer certain observations about that and to suggest some

directions future inquiry might take, with a degree of confidence. (1) To reiterate an historical point: Abhinava’s portrayal of god as prak&

reveals how misleading it is to classify him as a crypto-Advaita Vedantin. It similarly confutes the - in any case dubious - hypothesis of certain scholars

that KaSmir Saivism evolved (they really mean ‘improved’!) steadily from an agamic, theistic dualism to an idealistic non-dualism which received its highest

expression in the work of Abhinava and his disciple Ksemaraja.62

(2) Since I am primarily interested in the history (as well as the sociology and psychology) of ideas I wish to refrain from offering a philosophical

critique of Abhinava’s argument. I suspect, nonetheless, that recognizing its

weakness as argument can help one appreciate its theological efficacy. It seems to me that the argument is haunted by the failure to distinguish de-

cisively between ‘singularity of kind’ and ‘singularity of number’. Abhinava

begins with observations about the integrity of individual self-consciousness, and the essential similarity of consciousness in the case of all subjects. He concludes with the metaphysical assertion of the unity of consciousness

as such. (This is the ‘identity’ half of his portrayal of prak&z in terms of ‘identity-indifference’.) The conclusion seems to me to be of an entirely

different order from the evidence upon which it purports to be based. I do not see how it can follow from the observation that all consciousness is of

one sort that there is only a single consciousness, yet, in the end, that seems to be all that Abhinava is arguing. This is illustrated, I think, by his terminological inexactitude. Abhinava basically makes one claim - that con-

sciousness (tit, etc.) is ‘undivided’ (abhinna, abheda, apythak, anatirikta, avicchinna). This claim, and all these terms seem to cover both the premises

382 HARVEY P. ALPER

of his argument - that consciousness is (a) not separate from its object, (b) lacking internal division, and (c) common to all subjects - and the conclusion

- that consciousness is ‘one’ (all of the above terms and eka). If Abhinava himself admitted the validity of this criticism would it lead

him to abandon his argument for the ubiquity of pruk&a? I think not. Considering the intention of his argument, and the way it functions in his theology suggests that Abhinava would not find the sort of critique I have

outlined very telling. It is certainly true that Abhinava’s metaphysical claims

are meant to be ‘descriptive’. Prak&z is a term which, in one sense, refers to consciousness (or reality) grasped as a whole - albeit, if my analysis is correct

as cosmic process rather than as cosmic substance in the strict sense. As such the notion of prukdu presents real difficulties: how, after all may one cognize

such an all-inclusive reality, and what status would such an eccentric cognition

have? As far as I can tell, the argument of JSA l-9 far from dealing with these issues, presupposes the possibility of a comprehensive, ultimate cognition,

presupposes, in a word, the reality of liberating insight into the nature of the cosmos as a whole.

This is precisely as it should be, for Abhinavan metaphysics is not merely

descriptive. It does not so much point out a special object to cognize, as it calls for a revaluation of the cognitions one ordinarily has, that is an adjust-

ment in the manner in which one cognizes at all times. In this sense it is in its intention less descriptive than transformative (cf. Streng: 15Off.), and

perhaps, as it functions, it is less transformative than fiduciary. For Abhinava metaphysical argument is no end in itself; the final arbiter of an argument’s

success has to be not whether it compels agreement, but whether it induces an appropriate religious response.

(3) It seems to me self-evident that the theology of prukdu/tilhisa forms part of a larger whole in which Abhinava attempts to devise a picture of

ultimacy consistent with the dynamic vision of god in Saivite mythology. He portrays Siva-who-is-consciousness as being the embodiment of oppositions in the sense of being ‘unity within multiplicity’ and vice versa. He describes

this embodiment in terms of a ‘modal’ theology which highlights in turn the various aspects of the single figure of Siva. This yields, for example, the correlated theologies of prakdu and vimda, and the theology of the numberless M&s. In other words, what is ultimate for Abhinava is the totality of all relationships: the cosmic process itself. This he finally understands as being not just mechanical, nor even organic, but as ultimately


personal. The theology of pratida as one and many illustrates how a variety of oppositions may be held in tension through the personal metaphor of Siva:

praktida is god as consciousness - as impersonal, objective consciousness over

against subjective, personal consciousness; the relationship between the two sorts of consciousness being held entitrely within the transcendental, personal, consciousness who is Siva.

This understanding allows one to evaluate the juxtaposition of terms for ultimacy, some referring to a being, others to consciousness, noted at the

beginning of this essay (I. iii. a). To call the ultimate both Siva and tit is not

an arbitrary and contradictory way of naming a single reality, nor does it mean that two different realities are being artificially, and ex post facto,

brought together for social convenience. On the contrary, in Abhinava’s tradition the ultimate is from the beginning understood - and that means

apprehended, experienced, celebrated, taught - pluralistically: for the Saiva traditions of Kasmir there are a plurality of ultimates that inform each other.

This results, in the case of Abhinava, in a group of theologies - some parallel, some complementary, some overlapping - within a complexly structured

theological whole. These ‘component’ theologies, it should be noted, are not the so-called ‘school’ traditions (spanda, krarna, kula, and so forth) but are

within the confines of the pratyabh@iti itself, even defined most narrowly in terms of the IPK and its commentaries.

What then is one to make of Abhinava’s advaitism? One certainly cannot

deny that there are advaitic, world-disparaging passages in Abhinava’s works. What I urge is that the ‘escapist’ strand of his theology (the theology of tit?) should not be given priority in an off-hand and uncritical manner. It

should be set alongside other strands of the theology so that one can gauge

its place in the total picture. One may, in a sense, fairly call Abhinava’s theology non-dualist, or monist, but only if one understands that his is not the absolute advaitism towards which some of the followers of the

school of Samkara moved, but a relative advaitism which points out the non-

dual aspects of a complex world. Hence my use of the rough classificatory handle ‘bhedtibheda’.

Does Abhinava have a system in the strict sense? I think so, though I am not certain. He does seem to have a coherent but unstated goal: to encompass - without reconciling - contradictions, that is, to attempt to be faithful to the confusion ofexperience, to be consistent to inconsistency. I do not think this surprising. Abhinava produces exactly the sort of ‘Lebensphilosophie’

384 HARVEY P. ALPER

one might expect in a polytheistic milieu: a vision of god as the sum of an infinity of horizons; perhaps in a polytheistic setting, even a ‘high god’ may

be conceived pluralistically! Hence, Abhinava’s theology is of special com-

parative interest: it reveals one shape an idealistic monism may take if it

strives to express rather than repudiate a polytheistic setting. The result is what I call a ‘polyvocal monism’ - a monism which is true not to the

numerical plurality of gods, but to the intinite modes of human experience which is, after all, the real concern of polytheism. It is finally my understand-

ing of Abhinava’s monism as ‘polytheistic’ which persuades me that his theology must be interrogated not just conceptually, but imaginally, and in light of the rich set of religious experiences that - to borrow a phrase used by Robert Gimello (192) to speak of Mahayana Buddhism - add up to ‘a truly

quotidian enlightenment’.63 (4) From what I have sketched above the task facing the student of

Abhinava should be clear. What is called for is not more grand surveys and vague interpretations but detailed philological and conceptual exploration.

I would offer this guideline for such study: Incongruities in Abhinava’s thought can be explained roughly in three ways, as a result of historical conflation, as a result of conceptual confusion, or in terms of some unifying

structure (an ‘over-theology’) such as the process understanding of prakrfsa I have proposed in this essay. In spite of that proposal, the first two alternatives

should by no means be ruled out of court until Abhinavan scholarship has performed the same sort of chronological and conceptual reconstruction for

Abhinava that Paul Hacker has provided over the past three decades for

Samkara. Achieving such a reconstruction will not be an easy matter, for the plurality of Abhinava’s theologies are tied - in intricate ways resisting

decipherment - to the plurality of ‘moksas’ he recognized. While Abhinava’s theological and tantric texts may, up to a point, be explored independently, in the final analysis the most progress will be made by reflecting upon Abhi-

navan theology and slfdhand together. (5) Indian philosophy, on the one hand, and Indian mythology and

symbolism, on the other, are hardly ever studied concurrently. This, I fear, says more about divisions of labor in the western intellectual world than it

does about traditional India. It has particularly unfortunate results in the case of someone like Abhinava who, besides being rooted in the world of mythic gaivism, is a student of ntitya alert to the poetic overtones of word and gesture. I myself hope in future studies to address the question of the role of


Saivite myth in Abhinavan thought, and to take up the question of the

imagery of prak&z left unexplored in this essay. Here I wish only to indicate

one direction the latter inquiry might take. The essential clues are provided, 1 believe, by the notion of ubiquity, and by experiences of immersion in

consciousness which is often apprehended as a sea of light, experiences like

those described or alluded to in the preface to this essay. These clues suggest two related lines of imaginal explication: p&c&z as spatial effervesence, and

prakda as the sea at the heart of all things, two motifs that open up worlds of imagery extending back far into the Hindu past. The theology of pruk&a

speaks not only the language of scientific prose, but also in what one might call a language of spiritual and emotional liquidity. It hints at the dissolution

of ordinary ego consciousness, at immersion in the cave, the bottomless center of all phenonema; it seems to speak of overflowing, being brimful, of

being afloat in the depths of the sea.Prakda as liquidity has, however, as its counterpoint prakda as solidification. IXssoIution is balanced by the emitting of the material world. To borrow a felicitous phrase of Somananda (referred to in Gnoli, ET: 35, a passage not speaking directly of prakdia) it is balanced

by the “at first imperceptible wave which furrows the tranquil waters of

consciousness.” This counterpoint is reflected in practice: for the Saivite tantric immersion, the dissolution of ordinary consciousness, is never sought

for its own sake; it is sought for the sake of the return. The ‘deep’, and the solid world of multiplicity are to be seen as both the same and different.

Liberation is to recognize and accept that creation and destruction inhere within each other.

Following out these intimations I am tempted to call the theology of

prak&a not a modal theology, but a ‘tidal’ theology, for it is a theology which seems to serve as a sustained meditation upon the inexorable, un-

fathomable rhythms of in and out, open and shut, filling and emptying, some of the subliminal regularities, ambivalences, and antinomies underlying

human life. I realize that some will see these remarks as a mere flight of

fancy. For me it is more a pledge to return to the inquiry here initiated. (6) However great the discontinuities between contemporary, popular

Hinduism and the classical tradition, they do, in fact, draw their inspiration in large measure from a common well. If contemporary figures such as

Muktananda and Gopi Krishna do not have the theological sophistication and quickness, nor even the philosophical concerns of an Abhinava, still

their religious passions fall clearly into a single family with his. There is no

386 HARVEY P. ALPER

doubt in my mind that the experiences of the former, and the thought of the latter - despite important differences in position - shed light on each other. Hence I ask the reader to bring together for himself Gopi Krishna’s experience of immersion with the picture of pa&da’s creativity which Abhinava presents at the beginning of the J$A in a single, characteristically elegant, syntactically fantastic, sentence:

Objects (te$rn = bh&inlfm) appear as present, that is as clearly manifest, in the form ‘this.’ They appear as external, that is as differentiated (bhinna) because of their men- taJly fabricated [i.e., ‘imagined’, (kalpitu)] mayic separateness from perceivers in states ranging from &inyu through &rriru. It is for-this reason that they are distinguished (uicchinnu) from perceivers [who are mentally fabricated] through tiyd. [Their appearance as external] may be established through prum@u only because they are interior to the supreme perceiver who consists of pure consciousness (tit), that is because they have not lost their identity with him. Therefore the Lord’s cognitive power is said to be his illumining @ruk&nu) of objects as diverse @he&) In respect to their dependence upon perceivers [who are] fabricated [through m@y&] - [although ultimately] they are not different (ubhedu) from [his] unlimited (urzu~~~itu) consciousness (sayid) (1.5.1/ 153: n-154:6).bb

Southern Methodist University, Dallas, Texas

NOTES

’ Certain sections of this paper draw upon material presented at a meeting of the AAR- SW (PhillIps Univ., Enid, Oklahoma, March 1977), and at a Religious Studies Colloquy at SMU, November 1977. Other sections are to be drawn upon for presentations at the AAR in New Orleans, November 1978, and at the AOS, St. Louis, April 1979. For various suggestions and observations during the gestation of this essay I wish to thank Profs. Ludo Rocher and Wilhelm Halbfass of the University of Pennsylvania. They are, of course, free of responsibility for the final form it has taken. For their encouragement and stimulation I wish to thank my colleagues Frederick J. Streng and Lonnie D. Kliever; for their assistance in obtaining material unavailable in Dallas, Margaret Hamzy and Pat Rogers of SMU’s Fondren Library; and finally for their patient preparation of the manuscript, Peggy McNear and Kathleen Triplett.

Although there was some earlier notice the Saivism of KaSmIr was effectively brought to the attention of western scholarship with the publication of Btihler’s Report in 1877. Investigation of its theology only began after 1910 with the publications of Barnett, and, especially of Chatterji’s frequently followed monograph. For the most part the subject was not treated as a living variety of Hinduism before the publication of Silburn’s fist monograph in 1957.

There has been an unfortunate looseness in discussion of ‘schools’, ‘sects’, ‘traditions’, and ‘movements’ of K?&miri Saivism. All that is really clear is that there were a series of overlapping preceptorial lines, and a plenitude of spiritual techniques available to each


teacher. The exact social and ideological referent of terms such as prutyobh~titi, spanda, Agama, krama (on which see Silburn, MM & HK), and kuZa remains to be worked out, as does the systematic relationship between these ‘groups’. One must, in this context, applaud the observation of Gerald J. Larson in a recent review (1978: 239) that whatever it may be K6Smh-I Saivism is not an ‘entity’. After all, until recently its de facto boundary has been little more than the publications of the research department of the state of Jammu and KaSmir! For basic bibliography, see n. 7. * For example, Gopi Krishna and Baba Muktananda (and-his teacher, Bhagavan Nitya- nanda); Silburn speaks of her teacher Laksman Brahmacarin, and his teacher Harabhatta SHstri. 3 Please note that documentation is incorporated in the text between parentheses. Supplementary notes are indicated by Arabic numerals, the Sanskrit texts for translated passages by Roman letters.

All quotations from Utpaladeva’s &‘varapratyabhijCk&ik&s (IPK) and from Abhi- nava’s commentary upon it, the Vimar&ni (IPV), are taken from volume 22 (= IPV vol. I) of the Kashmir Series of Texts and Studies (KSTS) unless otherwise indicated. Occasionally I have adopted a reading of the IPV’s commentator, BhHskara (Bh), or of the one ms. of the IPV I have consulted (UP). This is always indicated in the notes. Citations from the IPV - e.g., (1.5.13/204: 3-4) - refer to adhik&ra, Ifhnika, and karikd, and then page and line. Quotations from KSTS 33 (= IPV II) are indicated by ‘II’ before the page and line. Citations from Bh are from vol. I of tbe Bh&kari unless otherwise indicated. All translations are my own unless reference is made to another translator. 4 Space does not allow discussion of the literature on the motif of ‘sinking’, or ‘immersion’ in mystical writing. Standard works such as Underhill, State, and Zaehner may be consulted, but they should be read in light of the critical discussion in Katz. It is of some interest to note that Romain Rolland’s experience of ‘oceanic’ oneness with the universe, apparently under the influence of the Ramakrishna movement, serves as the point of departure for Freud’s Civilization and Its Discontents. ’ On the Saivagamas see, e.g., Filliozat; Brunner; and Gonda, 1977: chs. 1, 11, and 12. Note that Abhinava uses the word igama quite broadly seemingly to indicate any authoritative treatise, e.g., Bhartrhari’s Eikyapadiya. 6 The evolution of Saivite thought between say 100 and 1300 A.D. is still imperfectly understood. For a recent summary see Gonda, 1977: 153-79; for a more general treatment Gonda, 1963: 188-252. To be sure, early works such as the &et&atara Upanisad possess a distinctive viewpoint on human existence, and one could fairly say that they are theological. I find it clearer, however, to use the phrase ‘Saivite theology’ more narrowly to mean the systematic articulation of the Saivite viewpoint in accordance with standards common to Indian philosophizing in general, and the defense of that viewpoint with arguments designed to demonstrate its superiority to various alternatives. Saivism becomes an object of sustained and critical reflection in that sense at a comparatively late date. In my understanding of the word theology I am influenced by the definition in Harvey: 239ff. 7 Neither Abhlnava’s thought nor the Saivism of KaSmir in general are well represented in the scholarly literature. One brief and readily available introduction is the essay of Basu. The pioneering work of Chatterji and the monumental study of Pandey may still be consulted with profit. Of a more specialized nature the studies of Silburn, Padoux, and Gnoli are indispensable. All students of this subject stand in their debt. One may also consult the surveys of Rudrappa, Sharma, and Kaw.

388 HARVEY P. ALPER

a No reconstruction of the history of the Saiva traditions of KaSmIr has yet been attempted, but on the Buddhism of KaSmIr see Naudou. Among the latest KHhIri Saiva figures (with dates as calculated by Pandey) are: Mahe&nImurda (12th), author of the MM; Jayaratha (12th/13th), author of the TAviveka; LalH (14th), author of KaimIrI devotional poems collected as the Lalldv&vlfni; and Bh%skarakantha (late lfith), author of the Bh&sskurI on the IPV. 9 For a summary of the development of southern Saivism see Gonda, 1963: 229-242, especially 23 l-34. to These dates which seem to have received general acceptance are discussed in Pandey, 1963. l1 Abhinava’s two major theological treatises are written in the form of commentaries on a 190 verse exposition of Saivism, the IPK (Verses on the Recognition of God), by Utpala. Both of these commentaries - the IPV and the VivytivimaAini (IPVV) - have been published in the KSTS (~01s. 22 and 33; and ~01s. 60,62, and 65 respectively). An English translation of the IPV by Pandey (1954) can be used most profitably by someone who already controls the Sanskrit. The most voluminous of Abhinava’s works deal with tantra, on which see the works of Gnoli and Padoux; the most famous deal with aesthetics, on which see Masson and Patwardhan, and Gnoli, 1968. ‘* I understand by ultimate “whatever is apprehended by someone as more important than anything else whatsoever.” This is an adaptation of William A. Christian’s definition of a religious interest (60f.). In contrast to Christian, a student of Saivism must focus on the question of polytheism, of multiple ultimates. l3 References to god in the IPV are hardly infrequent. Sound method demands that they be taken seriously. Except for the scholarly tendency - perhaps reinforced by the Hindu ‘renaissance’ interpretation of India’s religious history - to classify Pratyabhijril Saivism as merely another idealistic monism in imitation of Advaita Vedtita, this point would not need to be stressed. See the discussion of tibhrSsav@da below (III). l4 Since tit and samvid are, as far as I can tell, synonomous, I shall use them inter- changeably to refer to consciousness as such. Note, however, that Andre Padoux, in his latest work (1975: 72, n. 20), attempts to distinguish tit and samvid. The term citi is treated in the JSA in terms of vimars?a, and, therefore, its discussion will be postponed. l5 The distinction between ordinary and transcendental cognition is, to be sure, often blurred in the JSA, since Abhinava must analyze the former in order to demonstrate the nature of the latter, and since he wants to hold that the liberated person ultimately recognizes that the ordinary and transcendental act of cognition can be distinguished only because they are the same, i.e., indistinguishable! By and large, Abhinava does not resort to the theory of tuttvu evolution to explain this in the JSA, although that plays a more important part in some of his writing. l6 The first, the subject of this essay, is taken up at 1.5.1-9; the second is discussed at 1.5.10-21. r’ Because of his multi-level view of reality Abhinava could give no single answer to the question of the ontological status of objects. It is, nonetheless, clear that he considers all objects of cognition, which is to say, all &h&s including the objects of illusory or erroneous cognitions, to have what is in one sense genuine but in another sense qualified reality. Thus (1.5.14/210: l-2): “being is great because it pervades even [self-contradictory cognitions] such as of a ‘flower-m-the-sky’,” (si = satta] ca khapu@dikam api vylpnoti iti mahatii. See more generally the discussion of error as ‘imperfect’ (apti?a) appearance, 2.3.13/11.111-117.


l8 On the centrality of vyavahara to the Utpala-Abhinava scheme see also k. 6 where vyavahdra and cfbhdsa (appearance) are equated, and k. 16 where it is said that god “allows himself to be used” (prabhur . , . vyarahcirayet).

l9 To be sure in the classical language oisvaryu is just an abstract term for ‘potency’. In this theological context, however, I feel that it has a fuller, more etymological meaning. In contrast, in the IPV the world sakti rarely has the personal sense of ‘goddess’, but has the impersonal sense, ‘capacity’. 2o In k. 1 Utpala says, avabhcfsrfnrim . . antahshitavatarn eva ghatate bahiratmana (153: 8-l 1). Abhinava glossesghafate aspramanena upapadyate uktam tat pram&am dar$ayati (154: 7f). No formal argument is provided, but in effect Abh’inava implies that one may infer the process of the externalizing of abhdsas which are internal to god from the fact of their appearance. On the other hand, the liberated person would, presumably, be able to perceive the fact of god’s externalisation directly. 21 Among the rejected answers are (a) that the object is responsible for its own appearing - which in no way transcends its objects na punarapard kacit arthasarirottirna (154:13-155:9), (b) that appearance is brought about by a complex of concomitant causes - indriyaZokadiksanavargtit - as the SautrZintikas argue, (155:9-11). (c) that appearance to a subject can only be inferred from the clarity of a cognition which is itself a characteristic of the object - the prakatatavrfda of KumZrila (155:l l-156:9). All of these views, which would tend to reduce cognitive appearance to an epipheno- menon of objectivity, are rejected on the ground that they cannot account for the appearance of objects to some, but not to other perceivers (155: lff.). In addition the view that appearance is brought about by cognition itself is rejected as, in the end, reducible to the view that the object causes the appearance (156: 9ff.). 22 This entire section must be read as a simultaneous repudiation of dualism and a defense of realism, that is of vicitrabhasa, or vaicitrya. Note that the sense requires reading 160:5 as negative (with Bh, sa na tdvat jridnasya svartipam, or UP, sa tlrvaj

jridnasya na svartipam, rather than positive (with KSTS, sa tavat jrianasya svanipam). 23 One might discriminate this argument for the abhedatva (non-duality) of praktisa

from Abhinava’s earlier argument for its ekatva (unity). Abhinava had argued that only a unitary conscious ground allows one to account for the coordination of diverse cognitions. Here the dualists seem to argue that illumination having no connections, can have neither internal divisions nor plurality. That is an argument for consciousness as absolute, as one thing; Abhinava seems to be arguing for consciousness as ultimate, as one world, the single ground or necessary horizon of diversity. 24 Namely: that one can’t account for diversity by jtina (160:3-161:1), nor by artha

(161: If.), so it must be by prak#sa (161: 2ff.), but prak&a isabheda, and one can’t account for its diversity by reference to the objects themseleves (16 1: 4f.), or through a causal complex (ekasamagrTka, 161:7), or reflection (pratibimba, 162:2), or a variety of causes (karanadi, 162:5), or memory impressions (samskSra, 162: 8f.). 25 My translation of this rather elliptical verse is somewhat free, and is subject to reconsideration. I take prakasasya and svatmanah as ‘objective’ genitives - ‘for the sake of illumination’, and ‘for the sake of being itself’. I thus take the point of the verse to be the articulation of a fundamental antinomy: prakasa alone exists for itself precisely by means of becoming other. This quotation, then, underscores the nature of prak5sa as consciousness which becomes objective. The appearance in is a stepping out as well.

In the KSTS edition of the APS (published in 1921) the verses of Utpala are

390 HARVEY P. ALPER

accompanied by a brief commentary provided by Pandit Harabhatta Sastrr. His remarks on this verse are of some interest: “Thus, unless insentient objects depended upon samvid, they would be virtually non-existent (QSQ~); because of that the being (SQUVQ) of [objects] which by nature are nonexistent in themselves is nothing but the fact of their being connected with the subject @I&!+) whose nature is prakcfda. Therefore, prak&a- which-issQr?rvid alone, since it is characterized as moving within itself (sv~S~~OCC~QZQ~“),

may come out @rasphuret) as the multiplicity of the world which has been caused to appear (” ulldsite) through its own nuiydsfakti, by means of its double, the whole array of objects, sentient, and insentient, consisting of both subjects and objects, as it were as being separated and not separated from its own svanipa. Such is the unfolding of SVQtQntIyQVcfdQ according to Vanactiya(?).” Note the use here of some of the cosmogonic vocabulary characteristic of Saiva dynamism: ud-dal, ud-[as, pra-sphy, and pra-ud-mil. For text see Note 1. (One wonders whether atirikteneva should read atiriktenaiva, which would yield a reversal of nuance, if not really of intent.) 26 In his own words Abhinava summarizes: “Then, suspecting that [belief in] the independent existence of objects external to illumination has been reinforced by the refutation in verses four and five of nis~nl - [a theory] advanced by the vz@inavcida - in verse six he [Utpala] shows that even if one doesn’t accept vlisand [the correct view] is in no way obstructed. Then in verse seven, while setting forth the nature (~QWVQ)

of objects according to his own view, he rejects perception as proving (pramdnatva) the independent existence of external objects. Then in verses eight and nine he rejects [the theory] that external objects are inferable. as well (1.5. intro./l51:13-152:5). For text see note n. 27 It is clear that Abhinava is quite familiar with intraBuddhist polemics, and is particularly well versed in the school of Dignaga. A careful examination of the Buddhist material in the IPV is a desideratum. In this parvapaksa there are two Interlocutors, the first (A) arguing for real externals, the second (B) defending the theory of v&n&. While I am not able, at this point, to determine the sources for, or the precise identity of A and B, certain observations seem appropriate.

Abhinava himself identifies B as a Vijrianavadin (see n. 26). In general, B does fairly represent the position of the Yogacara-VijnPnavLda tradition, especially as formulated in the so-called epistemological school of Dignaga. Hence I follow Abhinava in calling it Vij%navHda. I further describe it as ‘idealist’ because it, like Abhinava, asserts the primacy of consciousness. This appellation, however, requires interpretation (see n. 28, and cf. Wayman), and has at times been challenged (e.g., Guenther: 92).

As to A, Bh (210) glosses brfbydrthawidibhib: bauddhavide!aih kathitam. MRS, the ed. of the IPV, refers specifically to the Sautrantikas (164: n. 60 and 61). This identification as Sautrantika is correct, but requires qualification. Abhinava seems to be writing in conformity to a widespread Hindu tradition according to which there are four systems of Buddhism: Vaibhasika, Sautrantika, YogacHra, and Madhyamika. Thus, Jayanta (a 9th KaBmiri) in the NM summarizes (Brahmananda Gupta: 18): “Denn nach Ansicht der Vaibhasikas existiert ein Ding in der Aussenwelt, und dies ist wahrnehmbar; nach Ansicht der Sautrantikas existiert es ebenfalls, ist aber nur erschliessbar; nach Ansicht der YogacPas gibt es nur die Erkenntnis, welche eine (bestimmte) From hat (S%ktiam), aber Keiner Gegenstand in der Aussenwelt, und jene (Erkenntnis) ist wahmehmber; nach Ansicht der Madhyamikas ist (diese) Erkenntnis rein und enth%lt keine Form (Akara).” This picture has been challenged (e.g., D. N. Schastri, 5 1-64) as lacking support in Indian Buddhist texts, but it is attested in Tibetan texts (Iida, 65f.,


also Guenther). As Frauwallner (PB: 62) observes, the history of the Sautrantllcas is still unclear. It is complicated by their having an early, close relationship with the Sarvastivada-Vaibhhikas, and their later merging with the epistemological school of Dign%ga, which considered itself essentially Vijrianavada (Frauwallner, 64,97ff., 118ff.; also, cf. Bareau). The fact is that A is not really Sautmntika in a strict Hinay%na sense (for it seems as close to the Sarvastivadins whom FrauwaIlner (62) describes as realists, as to the Sautmntikas whom he describes as nomlnalists), but is clearly Sautrarrtika as that tradition is represented, sometimes positively, sometimes critically, in the writings of Dignaga and his successors. For the appellation of this position as ‘realist’, in contrast to Vijiianavada idealism see n. 28. ** To appreciate the issues at stake in this discussion reference should be made to the dispute over the reality of external objects among the various Buddhist ‘traditions’ - as they had come to be understood by Abhinava’s time. On the case against externals, as well as the soteriological context of the ‘nothing but consciousness’ theory in the Yog&ira tradition before Dlgmiga see: (a) MSA 11:31-35 (Bagchi: 63f.; Fr. tr., Levi, 1907-11: vol. 2, 114-16); (b) MV, especially with Sthiramati’s TikH, 1.1, 3, and 6 in the numbering of Stcherbatsky and Nagao (1.2,4, and 7 in that of Pandeya). (Pandeya: 7f., 14ff., 19-22; Eng. tr., Stcherbatsky, 1936: 38,42-45,60,80-102); and (c) MS 2.14 and 8.20 (Lamotte: vol. II, 104-107,250-252). For parallel debates between realists and idealists: (a) TattvaS ch. 23 (bahirarthapariksa~ D. ShPstri: vol. 2,670-711; Eng. tr., Jha: vol. 2,936-88); (b) BSK (= On the Establishment ofExternal Objects; Eng. tr. and partially reconstructed Skr. text, Aiyaswami Sastri: l-65); and (c) Stcher- batsky, BL: vol. II, app. IV, especially 352-372 from Vlcaspatimisra’s Nyrfynkuniki. It is likely that Abhinava was familiar with some of this literature, e.g., TattvaS. For the locus classicus of this discussion, however, one should see PS I. 9-10 (Eng. tr., Stcherbatsky, BL: vol. II, app. IV, 377-400, with the comm. of Jinendrabuddhi and especially Hattori: 23-30, with particularly helpful notes, 97-111).

Due to the historical and systematic complexity of this debate, it is not a simple matter to formulate normative positions for the various parties. Some guidelines, based largely on Hattori’s discussion of Dignaga’s thought, may be of assistance. The epistemology of each school may be analyzed in terms of three issues: (1) whether it accepts the theory of .s~kBajrLinavtida, that “the cognition possesses the form @k&z) of

the object within itself” or, conversely, nir~k&+Linmida, that the cognition is itself formless while the object has form (Hattori: 98); (2) whether it considers cognition to be twofold in form (dvitipom), namely as ‘appearance as itself’ (svcibh&) and ‘appearance as object’ (@rthibhrSsa), or of one form (eJc&pu), be it strictly as itself, or merely as object (102, 108); (3) whether it accepts the theory of cognition being ‘self- cognition’ (svusa~vitri), “that a cognition is cognized by itself and does not need another cognition to cognlze itself” (101).

In these terms the Buddhist school which comes closest to an unqualified realism - in spite of the theory of momentariness, and a certain prejudice against entities - is the (%rvastivada-) Vaibhiisika who hold cognition to be nirdkmi and ekarcipa, and who do not appeal to cognition as svasqzvitti. For them, in a relatively straightforward way, a cognition is determined as the cognition of one thing rather than of another by its actually having one or the other external reality as its object (101,103, 108). In comparison to this position the Sautrantikas (and so Abhinava’s pzirvapak~a A) may be considered qualified realists, while the Vijrianavadins (and so Abhinava’s B) may be considered qualified idealists. Their positions are not after all diametric, but are in

392 HARVEY P. ALPER

certain senses reconcilable, for both pull back from the extremes of strict dualism or strict monism (as does Abhinava).

Both the Sautrtitikas and - insofar as it is relevant to this discussion (cf. Hattori: 98; also Kajiyama, 1965, who mentions another sort of sikira/ninikara distinction) - the Vijrianavadins understand cognition as siktira, as dvinipa, and as svasamvitti. How then do their epistemologies differ? For the Sautraritikas there really is an object outside of consciousness (the b&hy@rtha; in the final analysis: the ‘real particular’, svalaksana), but this object does not appear in cognition as itself, rather the cognitive object is its product, that is, its reflection. This reflection is related to the object itself through similarity (Czipya) with it (Hattori: 102). From this appearance in cognition as reflection the external object is to be inferred. For the Yogac%ras, in contrast, “the object is essentially immanent in the cognition” (104). “ . . . Consciousness (a#%~) itself appears (ffbhcfti . . . ) as subject (svdbhtisa . . . ) and object (arthribhdsa . . . )” (102). Hence nothing whatsoever exists externally. The distinction between subject and object, however, does hold true from the perspective of empirical, qualified reality (samvytisat). From an ultimate perspective there is only self-consciousness (svasa?vitti): “The cognitive phenomenon itself is not differentiated into subject and object, nor into act and result.” There is nothing but pure consciousness (vijtianamlitra) which is itself not an entity, but it differentiated into subject and object by the imagination (parikalpita) through metaphor (upaclru) (104,106). For general background to this see Frauwallner, PB: 350-365, an intro. to the Vi&atik& and Vetter: ch. 4, ‘Das Problem der Ans- chauung’. In dealing with Abhinava’s Buddhist material I am particularly indebted for his aid to Professor Ernst Steinkellner (U. Wien), who, however, should not be held responsible for errors in which I might still have fallen. 29 According to the Vijr’iPnavPda tradition v&anti (‘permeation’) is a connecting force which mediates between the unity of consciousness as such (aZayavij@nn) and the streams of cognitions. In terms of the epistemology discussed in note 28 it is the capacity of consciousness which accounts for its particularization in a continuing process of cog&ions. It is closely related, in origin, to the notion of bfja (seed). See: (1) MS 1.15-16, and 23-25 (Lamotte: 33f., 41-46); Lamotte observes (lo*) “Lesgermes ne sont ni differents ni nondifferents de l’Alaya, ‘parce qu’ils sont faits siens, appropries (uptitta) par I’Alaya, embrasds (parigrhita) dans son etre, partageant son destin bon ou mauvais (ekuyogaksema)’ [quoting: VMS-HT, de La Vallee Poussin: vol. I, 1241;” (2) T-VMS 18-19 (Levi, 1925: 36; Fr. tr., Levi, 1932: 107ff; Ger. tr., Frauwalhrer, PB: 388) where rSlayavijrilfna is said to possess ‘all seeds’ (sarvabfja) meaning that it possesses the capability to produce all things (sarvadharmotptidanadakti); and (3) VMS-HT (de La Vallde Poussin: I, lOOff.) where it is said, “Les BIjas, par rapport au Vijrilna, par rapport au fruit, ne sont ni identifiques, ni differents . . . . Tel est, en effet, le mode de relation entre la chose (svabhiva), VijiiHna, et l’activite (karitra), Bija; entre la cause (hetu), Bija, et la fruit @hala), Dharma actuel;” also, Frauwalhrer, PB: 328 and 354. 3o The interesting dispute about the inference of other minds is not in and of itself, central to Abhinava’s concern. See SAS (Kitagawa), SAD (Kajiyama, 1965a), and Stcher- batsky, BL: I. 521-24. 31 It is difficult to Fmd a happy English equivalent for ribhisa. By translating it as ‘appearance’ I do not mean to imply that it means ‘what something looks like.” On the contrary, Ebhlfsa is the objective aspect of every cognitive event, it is ‘that which has appeared’. As Abhinava uses the term, an rfbhlTsa is never the ‘image’ of something else, it is itself the ultimate objective element in the cognitive world. Hence, tibhlisa is closely


allied with pruk&z: to say that objects are illumined is to say that rsbhrisas appear. To say that god appears as the world (or that objects arise in god) is to say that god is constantly becoming the stream of rTbhrisas. How god generates clbh&rs and how our view of them is distorted by m@yri so that we see them in isolation from god are separate questions which are not directly relevant here. It should, however, be observed that, in accordance with his two-level (really multi-level) vision of reality, Abhinava seems to hold that Irbhdsus are only relatively ultimate, that is, they are ultimate within the sphere of the perceptible, cognitive world, but they are sublatable by consciousness as such (or god) which in some sense does transcend them. In German lrbhdsu may be translated as Erscheinungsbild. This more nearly conveys the elemental nature of dbhisu than the English ‘appearance’, but one must still be careful to remember that for Abhinava dbhrisa is not an image of a cognition which itself has a separate existence, but the objective aspect of a single flash of cognition. 32 Since Abhinava pictures the ultimate (Siva-who-is-consciousness) as that comprehensive reality which takes form as both the subject and the object, he is impelled to hold that everything which appears is, in some sense, conscious, even though he does not want to obviate the distinction which holds true on a penultimate plane between the sentient (~~a&) and the insentient (ia&). For example, this is discussed in JSA 11 where Abhinava observes that “because an object such as a crystal is unable to cognize (parcTmru!pm) either itself (dtmanam) or an object such as a pot it is insentient (iu@r)” (198: 3ff.), but then goes on to conclude that “ultimately everything in the world is clearly sentient (uja$zm evu)” (199: l-3). (The discussion in JSA 10-l 1, in particular pages 198 and 199, should be consulted.) For texts see note r. It follows that Abhinava is limited in using an insentient crystal or mirror as a model for any aspect of the cpm- plex cognitive interaction which, in sum, is god because it might tend to suggest a static and unconscious view of ultimacy. Nonetheless, one should not be surprised that Abhinava does press reflectionist analogies into service in some contexts. It is important to keep this in mind when evaluating the thesis that Abhinava teaches a sort of crypto- advuita and vivurtuvtidu. See Section III, below. 33 The remainder of JSA 6 (178:7-181:lO) presents supplementary rebuttals (ub- hyuccuyubddhuku) to externalism, the rebuttal based on cTbhcisav#du being considered primary. These secondary arguments do not enlarge the presentation of god’s ubiquity but they are of systematic interest, and in passing, illustrate the particularly close relationship between the Buddhist and Saivite traditions in tenth century KaSmir. In general Abhinava here follows the Buddhist refutation of the Vaisesika argument for externalism, the latter being based on the concept of uvuyavin (a ‘whole’), and upon atomism. Against the Vaisesikas Abhinava argues that neither the notion of avuyuvin nor atomism strengthens the externalist case because (1) one cannot demonstrate how there can be a whole which is different from (i.e., greater than) its constituent parts, and (2) one cannot show how atoms, being indivisible and minute, may aggregate to form concrete objects. For background to this discussion see Frauwalhrer, HIP: 53- 56,105-108, 115-118,159f.; D. N. Shastri: 158-179,256-261; and Hattori: 88ff., notes 1.38-41; 136f., note 4.12. It is quite likely that Abhiiava had Buddhist sources. Cf. in this regard: AK I.43 (Fr. tr. de La Vallee Poussin: I. 87-94, esp. 89) and III. 100 (Fr. tr., II, 209-214), and V-VMS 12-14 (Fr. tr., Levi, 1932: 52-54; Ger. tr., Frauwalhrer, PB: 373-376). The fiojti&%ik&z of Samkaranandana (or Samkararumda) which Abhinava mentions has apparently not survived. On this intriguing author who seems to have bridged Saivism and Buddhism see Gnoli, PV: xxiii-xxvi. It may also

394 HARVEY P. ALPER

be remembered that Kabmir was considered one of the strongholds of the Vaibhasikas. 34 The clause prdnabuddhidehldeh viti~akiyanmdtrasa~vidnipfit (185 : 1 f.) is not entirely clear to me. Pandey translates it as if it were subordinated to bdhyatvena, “as external to vital air, intellect, and body, to which limited power of consciousness is given” (1954:66). If, however, the meaning ba71yatvena were ‘external to . . . ,’ or ‘outside of. . . ’ it is my impression that Abhmava would typically have preceded it with a compound having a final term declined to mean ‘in regard to’, or ‘in the case of’, such as “apek~ayd’, or “ tve’, rather than a compound declined in the ablative. In any case, I believe that the sense supports a different translation. ‘Pr@za, buddhi, and deha’ is a sequence representing the increasing evolution or concretization of consciousness as such, its increasingly gross manifestation. The purpose of the clause is not to distinguish between the subject and object in cognition, but to distinguish between all manifested objects (including egos) on the one hand, and unmanifested consciousness in which objects are merely latent on the other. It seems to me that the clause gives a reason for the fact that objects which are externalized from consciousness, starting with pr@a, still do appear, albeit as concrete, in the form ‘this’. The reason is not that they are entirely external to consciousness, but that they do possess a portion, if only a diminished portion, of it. What Abhinava is getting at is just the inextricability of objectivity from - its inherence in - ultimate consciousness. As Silbum says (in a context which leads her to refer to JSA 7) “. . . la conscience integre tout a elle-mbme. Seul existe done ce qui est connu, n’existe pas ce qui n’est pas objet de connaissance” (MM: 118).

I take it that the central terms in the clause are vitiya and kiyat. Bh glosses the latter as ZeSa indicating that kiyat means ‘diminished’, and also, I feel, that it implies a substantive or material contraction. VitiFa must be understood as the opposite of utti?a (e.g., 155: 1). Uttirpa, from ud-tr, ‘to pass beyond’, ‘go above’, indicates superiority and transcendence. Consciousness as such, in one sense, is utti?a to cognitive objectivity. Vi&a, from vi-r?; ‘to pervade’, or ‘extend through’, indicates the splitting apart of something and its being distributed through some reality (in this case itself?), hence immanence. Thus consciousness as such is, in a second sense, vitti?a within itself. As objective it is Oyavahdra.

BhHskara (I, 228,1. 18-21) seems to say that pr@a. buddbi, and deha may be thought of as subjects Cgruhaka) in the sense that they are reduced forms of consciousness and thus still capable of grasping objects of their own (?). They are external in the sense that they are separate, i.e., individualized (prthaktva), but they are not utterly separate from supreme consciousness as such f.purasa?+Q. If that were not the case, then they would not appear at all (aprak&p&a), as was indicated in k. 1.5.2. It seems that BhHskara is stressing that ‘externals’ are not entirely removed from prah-&. Hence my reading of the ablative as ‘because’, rather than as ‘different from’.

MRS (p. 185, n. 225), if I am taking him correctly, offers little assistance. He states that Abhinava says ‘pr@u’, and so forth, in order to point out how that which is external from supreme prak&a (paraprah&id bahirbhtitutve) in that it is not connected with the event of appearing (aprak&muinat~puttiprasafigdt) is established in regard to mayic perceivers (hzlpitapraml). For texts see note v. 35 It is, obviously, much beyond the scope of this paper to present arguments for my suggestion that Abhinava does not take tit as an absolute entity. I in general propose a process rather than an essentialist interpretation of Abhinava’s theology. The question is whether he holds that there is any unsublatable entity. It seems to me that Abhinava holds that the only ‘thing’ which is unsublatable is the whole cosmic process itself.


Hence, his metaphysics is finally bhedribhe& rather than ~dvait~. (See below, Section III, especially n. 58.) An intriguing question arises from these considerations. Does Abhinava, given his understanding of language, of meditation, of aesthetics, appreciate the metaphorical or hypothetical nature of any theological utterance? While I am not certain about this, it seems to me that it might be the case. 36 The comments of Bh on yogic creativity are of some interest. He questions (rhetori- cally) why an analogy is made with objects fabricated by yogis, since such objects are not ordinarily seen. He answers that reality is in fact the fabrication of a magician (indr~jdzh), and adds that god (as magician) is ‘habutuated to play’ (kri&i.GZ~), such is his self-dependence! Perhaps, too, he conveys something of the religious amazement underneath Abhinava’s metaphysical speculation when he quotes the enigmatic SSU 1 .12: vismayo yogabhtimiko (“the [various] (?) stages of yoga are astonishing”). (For discussions of this verse cf. MukGnanda: 4Of., and Shrinivas Iyengar: 258.) See: Bh I. 227-29.

37 The italics in the quotations from Frauwalhrer, Pandey, Silburn and Kaw are mine. If one peruses the literature on Kasmiri Salvism, one finds that while no one has dealt directly and fully with Abhinava’s interpretation of niiup&ddna creation, the two possibilities - “WithOUt an uprSdcma” and “without an upridrIna external to consciousness ‘I - both recur regularly, sometimes in the same volume. Thus Pandey while translating IPK 1.5.7 as we have seen, in another place says, “The Pratyabhijna, therefore, holds that the phenomenon of knowledge owes its being solely to the will power of the Universal Consciousness, which at the time of each cognition manifests externally anew the subject, the object, and the means of cognition very much like a Yogin, who brings immediately into existence the innumerable objects, which he desires, by sheer force of will, without the assistance of any external thing whatsoever” (1963:400). R. K. Kaw unintentionally sums up the lack of clarity by managing to interpret ?kiiprSdanQ both ways in a single sentence: “He [Utpala] says, the Lord . . . manifests externally all the objects . . . without requiring any material cause . . . ‘like a Yogin . . . without recourse to any extraneous substance”’ (151)! Nonetheless he later concludes, “The teacher means to say that icchl (will), i.e., sv&mtrya of the Lord (freedom of consciousness) itself has the characteristic of being Up&ddna-kdr@a (material cause), viz., hetutd, of this world, its Nimitta-kcfrana (the efficient cause), viz., karvt& and kriya‘ (the act of causation)” (219). 38 Since all ordinary objects are also held to be objects of divine creation according to Abhinava, they are subject to two sorts of causal relationship. Penultimately, they are subject to the ordinary law of cause and effect, from which valid inferences may be drawn. Ultimately they are subject to the special causal law governing the constant divine fabrication of the cosmos. In other words, ordinary causation, and also yogic causation, are special cases, subdivisions, of divine causation. 39 For a more technical discussion of causation one may turn to IPV 2.4.1-21 which deals entirely with causal theory. See especially IPK 2.4.10 where it is asserted that a yogi creates objects mrdbije vinaivecch&z’ena - “by means of his will and entirely without clay or seed,” that is without a material cause (II.l50:9f.). To condense a complicated matter, in IPV 2.4 Abhinava draws the following picture of causation. (1) He accepts SQttiryQVcidQ (IPK 2.4.3/11. 138:8ff.). (2) He interprets relation between cause and effect (krlryak&?~bh~vva) in terms of relation between actor and action (karvkarmabhlfva) and thus identifies agency (kart?TC, nirtitrta as being the primary cause (11.135:4-S and 7; 136:5-6). (3) He more radically asserts that the subject

396 HARVEY P. ALPER

(identified with god) is the sole cause (pranuitaiva karanam bhavati na jadah, 11.144:14), but tempers this by insisting that the subject invariably appears as a material cause with whom the subject as personal cause associates. In other words, god is both material and efficient cause: “This is the fmal thing to say about the matter - god alone appears (bhasate) as being a sprout by virtue of being associated with the appearances of seed, earth and water [i.e., examples of various specific upddanas]” (IPV 2.4.8/11.146:4-6), for text see note w. Abhinava clearly positions himself in favor of god as the single, ubiquitous, but ‘bimodal’, cause of the diverse cognitive world. The matter is summarized at the conclusion of 2.4.10 (11.153.1-13), and 2.4.21 (11.186:1-187:4), which should be consulted. 4o One should remember that the establishing (stha) or demonstrating (sddh, sidh) of something, that is its having pram&z, is not intended to refer primarily to argumentation, the demonstrating to someone that something exists, but to ontology, that in fact it does exist. 41 One of the most interesting aspects of Abhinava’s theology - reflecting, no doubt, his deep but not slavish indebtedness to Bhartrhari - is his argument that the declensional nature of language itself - that is, the fact that in the Sanskrit language nouns are declined in various cases - indicates the necessarily personal nature of the universe as ultimate. See, for instance IPV 2.4.14-16. Abhinava’s predilection for this argument, of course, reflects a fundamental difference in metaphorical preference between im- personally oriented Buddhism, equivocal Ved%nta, and personalizing Saivism. 42 The tension between Abhinava’s notion of the ubiquity of prakasajabhtisa and his realistic pluralism obviously raises some thorny issues. It takes much scholastic ingenuity for Abhinava to delimit perception and inference, while defending the latter (on which see IPV 2.3.1-17), and to articulate a theory of error (on which see IPV 2.3.13). 43 The context suggests that the word sambhavantinumdna, an ‘inference which is an hypothesis’, might best be translated loosely as ‘hypothesis’, or ‘analogy’, with overtones of ‘theory’, and ‘possibility’. Thus Bh (230) says, “tarkanipam anumanam, na tu drdham anum&am.” Abhinava is not here contrasting two competing inferences but two models of - or metaphors for - cosmogony, one externalist, the other internalist. He does not here address the question of whether abhdsas themselves must be demonstrated through inference or are known through perception. 44 This important point (see Section III) tends to be obscured by two facts. Abhinava does use reflectionist language in describing the internal ‘mechanism’ of acts of cognition. Such acts are, however, in his view completely contained within consciousness. Second, Abhinava tends to use the very words, e.g., pratibimba, darpana, sphatika, associated with reflectionism in articulating his own anti-reflectionist model. The contrast is between, on the one hand, consciousness as a mirror in which external objects are reflected, or illusory objects appear as if real and external, and, on the other, consciousness as a translucent orb, let us say, a magician’s ‘crystal ball’, onto whose surface internal, objective realities are projected. L. Silburn, speaking of a pre-Abhinavan $gamic text observes, “a la difference du bimba qui est independant du miroir, le pratibimba qu’ad- mettant les Sivaites Trika n’existe que comme un reflet dam le miroir de la Conscience universelle: le monde ne peut done Ztre percu comme &pare du miroir” (VB: 159). 45 Although the matter still requires considerable investigation, I would venture the hypothesis that Abhinava subscribes not to the simple equation ‘being is becoming’, but to its variant ‘being is at the same time both identical to and different from becoming’. Cf. the discussion of mahdsattri JSA 14 (209:15-211:4), and n. 35 and 58.


46 The p&vupuk~, implicit in k. 8, raises the possibility that there might be inferable objects which have not appeared. He argues that one can infer externals as the cause of which cognitive diversity is the effect. As an example, he cites the inference of sense- organs (indtiyas - internal organs, not to be confused with eyes, ears, and so forth) which have not appeared from their effects (sense perceptions), on the ground that one in general recognizes the principle of causality; all effects have causes, as in the case of seeds being the cause of sprouts. Frauwallner aptly summarizes the kdrikds which are replying to this: “iiberdies kann durch Schlussfolgerung mu erschlossen werden, was irgendeinmal bereits Gegenstand der Wahmehmung war . . . . Das gilt such fttr die Sinnesorgane, die zwar an sich unwahmehmbar sind, die aber bloss als Ursache der Wahmehmung erschlossen werden; und Ursachen an sich sind aus der Erfahrungbekannt. Aussere Gegenstlnde ausserhalb der Erscheinungsbilder im Erkennen sind aber nie und nimmer wahrzunehmen und konnen daher such nicht erschlossen werden” (1962:27).

The p~rvapuk~u using the words of the ,!&crabhti~ya here takes for granted the twofold division of inference of the M-~&n&i tradition: ‘that based upon a directly perceived relationship’, and ‘that based upon a generalized relationship’ where the actual connection between the cause (e.g., the sun’s movement) and the effect (e.g., the sun being in different positions in the sky) has never been, and, in the nature of things, can never be observed. The first sort of inference is said by Sahara to be based upon pratyak;ato dycasambandha, the second upon uirminyato dfltasambandha. (Jha, SbBh 1.5, vol. I, 15; for text Mimkosa, part I, 392). In order to place Abhinava and this ptirvapuksa in the context of the rather involved question of types of inference, see: Athalye, ed. TurkuS: 45; also 251-256, Ruben, tr.,NySti 1.1.5: 3 and 157-161 and the articles of Oberhammer, and Wezler. 47 For a more complex philosophical analysis of these notions than I shall be able to present here, the reader may consult Hacker, and chapter nine - ‘Strong Dependence Relations’ - of Potter. 48 It is quite possible - on systematic grounds one could say likely - that BhHskara’s bheddbheda represented a conservative sort of non-illusionistic Vedanta which one might even argue should be accepted as the ‘original’ or, at least, ‘central’ teaching of the Brahmasiitras. See in this regard van Buitenen’s essays ‘The SadvidyP in Ved%nta’, and ‘The Ancient Masters’ (ch. 1 and 2 of his introduction to RBmamrja’s Vedfrthosumgraha). He observes (16): “Bhaskara would seem to represent a more traditional view of Ved%nta which admitted pari@ma within the absolute and perfect B&man, a view which both Sarikara and RZm%nuja declined to accept without profound modification. Sarikara’s modification toward illusionism was perhaps the simplest and, on the given premises, the most logical procedure . . . [Samkara’s] view is, in the final analysis, a development of a more ancient Ved%nta view - as represented later on by Bhaskara - in that it accepts some effected change of and in B&man, yet questions the ultimate validity of the conditions of this change and consequently of the change itself.” Van Buitenen en- capsulates Bhaskara’s teaching as “uupddhikavlida: [the] doctrine that B&man, con- ditioned by real updhis [‘limitations’] , constitutes the phenomenal world” (221, n. 235). See also the important article of Ingalls (1967) who observes that the neglect of Bhsskara “may be due to the popularity of Bhaskara’s opponent, Samkara, or it may be because the tenets of his system were more subtly elaborated in succeeding centuries by the ViSistadvaita in South India and by the Saiva systems in Kashmir” (61)! Much of what Ingalls has to say about BhLskara would also hold true - allowing for translation to a Saivite and tantric milieu - for Abhinava, with the significant caveat that

398 HARVEY P. ALPER

Abhinava’s theology, far from denying with Bhaskara the possibility of liberation while alive, is organized precisely to facilitate such/7vanmukti, the goal of becoming a siddha. (To protect the unwary let it be added that this Bh%skara is different from the con- siderably later and less formidable commentator on the IPV). 49 I go into this much detail because there has been an unfortunate tendency to interpret KSSmiri &ivism (seen as a unit, no less!) in terms of Advalta Vedtita meaning by that thk recent, homogenized version, though this is sometimes read back into earlier figures, not excluding Sarpkara. Thus Gerald Larsen (241) on L. N. Sharma’s Kashmir Suivism: “Although the book purports to be primarily about Abhinavagupta, the foundation for the comparative analysis is derived almost exclusively from Salikara (and Salikara as read through the modern, Neo-Vedtita eyes of Murti, er al.). In other words, only Sarikara’s questions are asked, namely the nature of the self, the means of knowledge, the theory of error, and so forth. The corpus of Abhinavagupta is then interrogated with these questions. What would be much more interesting and valid would be to reverse this perspective or at least to allow Abhinavagupta’s questions to interrogate Sarikara.” To this one can only say, ‘Indeed!’ Still, the comparison of Abhinava and the advuitu traditions is an invaluable aid in understanding Abhinava provided that the comparison is executed in a discriminating manner. So Hacker (1953: 191) cites the appropriate and concise formulation of Dharmarija Adhvarin (17th): “‘Puri~~mu liegt vor, wenn ein Produkt entsteht, das die gleiche Seinsart besitzt wie die materielle Ursache; Vivurtu, wenn ein Produkt entsteht, das nicht die gleiche Seinsart wie die materielle Ursache be&t,” that is (191, n. 1) “parinamo ntia upldtia-sama-satt%ka-klyripatta; vivarto n$ima upLdtia-visam-sattaa-k?i.&patti~,” VeaSntuputibh&i I. 85. ” Hacker’s summary merits quoting (193); “Der par@mavHda lehrt die Einheit von Urstoff und Produkt: beide sind eines und dasselbe; das Produkt ist bloss eine andere Form oder ein anderer Zustand der causa materialis. Das ist eine Art Monismus. Nun will aber gerade der Vivartavsda monistisch sein - obwohl er, unter einem gewissen Aspekt betrachtet, einen scharfen Dualismus zu vertreten scheint . . . . Das Bestreben, die absolute Transzendenz und vor allem die Wandellosigkeit des Brahman zu verteidigen, hat also zunlchst scheinbar einen Dualismus geschaffen: das geistige Absolutum und sein Produkt, die ungeistige Welt, sind viillig verschieden. Nur der Illusionismus kann hier den traditionell-vedantischen Monismus retten.” 52 The English word ‘projection’ may translate a large variety of Sanskrit terms deriving, for example, from the roots bhl (also: &bhd and uvu-bhuj, wj, pruth, and pru-ktid itself. All of these verbs, as used by Abhinava, convey the cognitive-material ‘precipitation’ of the world out of, but still within, diva-who-is-consciousness. 53 Only the subject qua subject - on whatever level of reality - is self-dependent. This principle, however, gives rise to some nice puzzles, for while the subject is defined as subject precisely by being self-reflective, the subject to the extent that it becomes object of this reflection is no longer self-dependent! Hence the fascinating discussion of the Htman’s being at once svutuntru andnim2itu (fabricated) (J& 16,215:13-217:li). 54 This is actually put in the mouth of a piirvapaksa, but he is aptly encapsulating Abhinava’s position. ” In this sense pruk& is structurally parallel to such notions as pruk# in SIrpkhya, and rniyti in some sorts of Vedtita. Cf. Silbum (MM: 34, n. 5): “F?uk& correspond au don& d ce qu’est la mat&e pour les syst&mes r&listes mais qui, pour les Sivaites monistes, est essentiellement conscience.”


s6 For sure, the theology of prak& reveals only one angle of Abhinava’s theory of manifestation. To get a fuller taste the reader might consult a few passages from the complementary discussion of vimar&, JSA 10-21, for example: (a) 1.5.14/208:7- 209:3 and the subsequent quotations;(b) IPK 1.5.15-16/213:8-15; (c) 1.5.18/223: 3-6; and (d) 1.5.18/224:4-12. These passages introduce, besides the theory of vim&a,

the concepts of citi, span&, and tiya. Unfortunately space precludes their discussion here, but the reader should be forewarned that they are not without their interpretive, and even textual difficulties. 57 Pandey’s attempt (1963: 41-43) to divide Abhinava’s career and works into three ‘periods’, unfortunately lacks credibility. Gnoli comments (ET: 14): “I tentativi fatti di voler scorgere in Abhinava tre grandi momenti, uno mistico, l’altro estetico, e l’altro fiiosofico, sono affatto arbitrari e, in realm, tutto lascia pensare the questi tre interessi abbiamo convissuto pacitlcamente insieme, esprimendosi di tempo in tempo in questa o quell’opera, da quelle phi piccole (inni, etcetera) a quelle di mole maggiore.” Cf. Padoux (1975: 9, n. 3) where he (and according to him Silburn, and Laksman Brahmacarin) dispute Pandey’s chronology. 58 The question of to what extent Abhinava does hold a substantialist view - of whether he holds that there is any unsublatable entity (cf. n. 35) - is certainly complex, and evidence may be adduced on both sides. It seems to me that this very ambiguity is

itself evidence that Abhinava subordinates a ‘conventional’ (or prestigious) view of the

ultimate as sustance to his own, more daivite and tantn’c understanding of it as process. This, a move quite congenial to bhedribheda, literally allows him to have his cake and eat it too. Demonstrating that this is indeed the case would involve a careful interrogation of Abhinava’s use of several concepts, for example: (1) sv&zntrya, (2) hkti, (3) mah&atti,

(4) Stinya, (5) bhitti. All of these can be read, to one extent or another, in support of a process interpretation of ultimacy. Note, to take only one instance, the idea that the world picture is painted upon ‘no-wall (abhitli), ‘without a back drop’, implying in part that the ‘actors’ (themselves not substantial either!) make up the ‘stage’ by the process of their acting as they go along, StC 9 quoted by Abhinava IPV 2.4.10; 11.253.12-13. (On this compare Silburn, 1964: 104f.; Minoru Hara: 214; and the references cited.)

In general it seems to me that Abhinava goes far beyond Bhartrhari in subordinating essences to processes, until the ultimate becomes nothing more than a web of changing relationships. (Cf., for example, Bhartrhari’s understanding of mahcfsattd (Subramania Iyer: 246, 259) with Abhinava’s dynamic, vitalistic equation of being as such with citi (‘expansive consciousness’) and sphuratti (IPK 1.5.14/207:12-208:2; JSA 14/209: 15-210:2).

I f my process interpretation is correct, it suggests a historical hypothesis: that Abhinava - far more than Bhartrhari, or even Samkara, was heavily influenced by the anti-substantialist polemic of Buddhism. This, of course, dovetails nicely with the fact that Abhinava is known to adopt ksanikavdda, to accept a version of apohana (IPV 1.6.1-11, see Frauwallner, 1961: 28f.), and, along with both the Saiva and Buddhist tantras, to speak of a series of ‘emptinesses’ (Stinyas) (see, e.g., Silburn, VB: 51-59). On Buddhist influence in the origins of KLBmIri Saivism see, e.g., Gnoli, ET: 19-26. A considerable amount of scattered and diverse evidence has persuaded me that the premier problem of research for students of both the ritual and philosophical history of the Saiva traditions of KasmIr must be the relationship between the various forms of Buddhism and Saivism in KaSmIr. ” I follow Hacker’s and Potter’s discussion of these figures. For the purposes of this

400 HARVEY P. ALPER

essay it is not necessary to deal with the differences between the VP and the VPvrtti, nor with the question of the authorship of the Vrtti, though one may note that Hacker and Subramania Iyer agree in assigning it to BhartIhari himself. For comparison see Subramania Iyer (16-36) and Biardeau (1964: l-21). 6o Such is the case with the VPvrtti, too. Hacker (1953: 202) notes the subordination there of the formula “the ultimate is neither this nor that” to the formula “the ultimate is this as well as that.” He says the former only serves as a means of describing the ontological paradox of the appearance of a world, points out the similarities of the uytti’s position to bhe&ibheda and concludes “ . . . ihr Inhalt unterscheidet sich vom System eines BhartIpraparica oder Bhbkara mu dadurch, dass er, wie wir gesehen haben, em iUusionistiches Element einschliesst.” 61 For the sake of brevity I quote only Hacker’s summary, but the interested reader should consult his translation of this unusually lucid passage. I have unfortunately not had access to the text. 62 For example, different versions of his theory are offered by Chatterji, Pandey, Sharma, and Kupetz. I question its correctness not only in the case of Abhinava, but also in terms of his predecessors Utpala and Somtianda. Indeed the assumption that ?@mic Saivism is dualistic, or even that the Saivagamas (or more accurately different ggamic pericopes) may be classified in terms of the categories advaita and dvaita is itself highly questionable. Gonda’s characterization (1970: 41) of the theology of puriinic Saivism may serve to caution against too clumsy a Vedtitic reading of the history of Saivism in general: “It is, to conclude, sufficiently clear that Sivaite speculation, utilizing elements of an ancient cosmological myth and guided by the influential SPmkhya theory of the evolution of the world and the cosmic processes, had remodelled the ancient idea of God’s eight aspects distributed over the whole universe into a system of His eightfold manifestation, presence, and activity which at the same time expressed the fundamental truth that God and the world are one” (see note 48). 63 Space does not aBow me to delineate the similarities and differences between my interpretation and that of others. In brief, my theses are most unlike those of L. N. Sharma who interprets Abhinava to teach ‘Saiva absolutism’. It seems to me that they are in general compatible with the interpretation of Gnoli as expressed, for example, in the introductions to his translations of the TS and TA. He is particular stresses the flexibility and dynamism of Abhinava’s vision. Commenting on a passage of Abhinava’s treatise on the Malinivijaya Tantra that deals with the relation of multiplicity and unity he observes (ET: 59): “Questa molteplicita e queste distinzioni sono reali, reaiissime, perch6 rappresentano lo stesso attuarsi deIla coscienza come uniti e identita. Se, infatti, la coscienza fosse priva di parti, essa, come abbiamo veduto, non sarebbe phi neppure coscienza, ma una cosa o anzi il nuBa” (see also 38ff.).

SANSKRIT NOTES

a mah&guhrIntarnirmagnabhgvajHtaprak.&kah / j%na&aktipradIpena yah sadg tam stuma.h sivam // (1.5. intro/l51:4f.). b iti andhat jagatah (1.5.2/155:8f.). c ant%rupatL na trufyati . . . tat ca sadaiva, “the internality [to god of objects which appear] is not ruptured . . . and this internality is continuous,” Bh and UP read ahan t&BpatL ‘egoness’ for KSTS anttiupata (1.5.10/192:8-10).


d kim tu tatra [ Bh: tasmin bhavajate] aham iti ucite paramarse yo ‘yam idantapara markah saiva bIihyatI, tat ca iha antahsthitatvam aham ity etiivata citsamucitenaiva vapusa paramarsanam, tat ca iha nil&Gm asty eva, na tu nasti iti, yadi hi na syat . . iti sarpkiryeranvyvaharah (1.5.10/192:12-193:9). e anujjhitasarpvidabhedasya bhavasya kalpitapramatrapeksaya bhedena prak&anam bhagavato jrianasaktir ity uktam bhavati (1.5.1/154:4-6). f ekasyaiva prakasasya evambhiitakramakramakaryakaranabhavadivipya- prada&nasamarthyariipam’aisvaryam, iti tavat paryavasayayitavyam (1.5.4-S/163: 12- 164:1). g prag ivartho ‘praka.@r syat praklsatmataya vlna / na ca prakaso bhinnah syad atmar- thasya prakasata // (IPK 1.5.2/154:9-12).

bhinne prakase cabhinne samkaro visayasya tat / prakalatma prakasyo ‘rtho napra- ka6aS ca siddhyati // (IPK 1.5.3/159. 3-6). KSTS, Bh, and UP agree on siddhyatz’ rather than sidhyati. h tasmat bhinnah prakaso ‘rthasya sarpbandhi bhavati iti sambhavanaiva nasti / ataS ca idam upapattya Lyatam - arthasya svartipam prakasamtiatvam prakasabhinnatvam iti (1.5.2/158:4-8). i yadi arthat anya eva jiiHnatmH prakatah ata eva bhinno ‘rthatah, tarhi svatmani tasya prakasamatrarupatvat abheda eva (1.5.3/160:1-3). j aprakasasya prasiddhir eva na kHcit, svatmani hi niIam yadi pitam na kirpcit va, tat kim dusyet (1.5.3) (163:3-5). k evam atmany asatkalpah prakasasyaiva santy ami / jade prakasa evasti svatmanah svaparatmabhih // (Aja@upramdtysiddhz~ [Demonstration of the Existence of a sentient Perceiver] 13, KSTS 34 (Siddhitrayi) p. 5 of the first set of ntiguri nos., quoted: 1.5.3/ 163:6-7). 1 ittham jadabhav%nam samvidvi&ntim vinlsatkalpatvlt svatmany asatsvabhav%nam jriLtuhpraklSasvabhHvasya bamhandhitayaiva sattvam, tasmat samvitprakasa eva svat- mocchalattaya svamaylSaktyullasite visvavaicitrye jadajadabhavarasidvayena vedyaveda- katmakena svarupanatiriktenltirikteneva prasphuret, - iti svatantryavadasya pronmilanam sucitav%nnHc%ryah // (KSTS 34, p. 6 of the first set of miguri nos.). m prakHSaS ca asau katham / yadi prak&ataiva ghafasya vapuh saiva patasya ity adi visvavapuh prak&ah siddhih (1.5.3/163:9-11). n tato dvayena prakLSab%hyannHm artha@r sadbhavam vijr%avHdopagatavHsanadusanena drdhikrtam Bsarikya, trtiyena tadanabhyupagame ‘pi &vat na kiiicit uparudhyata iti darsayati / atha Slokena svadarlane ‘rthatattvam upadarsayan bWy%rthasadbhHve pratyaksam nirakaroti pram*atvena / tato dvayena anumeyat?im api bahyasya nirasyati (1.5. intro/151:13-152:5). o tattadakasmikabhaso bahyam ted anumapayet / na hy abhinnasya bodhasya vicitm- bhasahetuta // na vasanaprabodho ‘tra vicitro hetutam iyat / tasyapi tatprabodhasya vaicitrye kim nibandhanam (1.5.4-5/164:11-165:4). p tasya [= bodhasya] ca abhinnasya kadacit &ibhHsata kadacit pitabhasata iti ye vicitrabhasalr tatra klranatvam hi yasmat na upapannam - hetau abhinne karyabhedasya asambhavat, tasmat sa sa vicitranilapitadirtipa akasmiko ‘jriHtapratyaksasiddhahetukah san bahyam vijr%Inagatapratibimbatmakasvasvabhavasampadakam aucityava&t nijarirpa- sadrsam kramopanipatadrtipabahutarabhedatmakam jr&at sarvatha prthagbhutam anumapayati iti sambhhayate bahyarthavfdi (1.5.4-5/166:2-167:2). q [ yadyapi ZbhastinLm jnHnZntarvartinHm aparamarthikam samvrtisattvam ucyetZ.pi, tathapi yat es@ kPanam tat vastusad eva arigikZryam] - avastunah sarvasamarthya-

402 HARVEY P. ALPER

virahitalak~asya ktiyasampPdanapr@itasamarthyatmakasvabhavtiupapatteh (1.5.4- S/167:11-168:4). * Btmanam tam ca ghatadikzup sphatikadih na parHmrastum samartha iti jadah . . . (1.5.10/198:3~5); sar&n tuvastuto . . . ajadam eva.. . (1.5.10/199:1-3). s syHd etad avabhasesu tesv evavasite sati / vyavahtie kim anyena bahyen%nupapattinH // (IPK 1.5.6/176:9-177:2)

cidatmaiva hi devo ‘ntal#hitam icchavaild bahih / yogiva nirupad%nam arthajatarp prakagayet // (IPK 1.5.7/182:3-6)

anum&nam anlbhatapurve naivestam indriyam / abhatam eva bijader abhh%d dhetn- vastunah //

abh&@t punar abhasad bahyasyasit katharpcana / arthasya naiva tenasya siddhir nHpy anumzinatah // (IPK 1.5.8-g/186:6-187:2). t anayapi kastakalpanaya b&y%n arthan prasadhayata bhavata taih na kinwit kartavyam, HbhHsair eva taih bhavata abhyupagataih vyavahtiasiddheh, na hi nity%numeyena kaScit vyavahtia iti kim b%hyena, yatra sadhakam ca nHsti pramanam, badhakam ca prakH&t bhede anumeyatayapi prak&nabhava iti that mukhyam (1.5.6/177:9-178:7). u yogisamvida eva SP tPd$i &aktih - yat Hbh%avaicitryariipam arthajatam prakagayati iti / tat asti sambhavah - yat sarnvit eva abhyupagatasvatantrya apratighatalaksanat icchavi~esava&t sanwido ‘nadhikHtmatayH anapayat antalwthitam eva sat bhavajatam idam ity evam pr?qtabuddhidehadeh vitirnakiyanmLtrasanwidrtipat bahyatvena Ibhrisayati iti, tat iha vilvariipLbhLsavaicitrye cidatmana eva svatantryarp kim na abhyupagamyate svasarpvedanasiddham, kim iti hetvantaraparyesa@prayhena khidyate / (1.5.7/184:9- 185:6). v pr$tabuddhidehPdeh - gr%hakatvenabhimatHt pri+radeh, kid@? arthat parasarhvidaiva vithnam kiyanmatram - svavisayagraharxtmatrasamartham le&uupam, sarpvidrtiparp yasya tad@, bahyatvena - prthaktvena, na tu parasamvida prthaktvena, anyatha ‘prf+g ivarthah’ iti uktanyayena aprakL&pHtLt (Bh 1.228:18-21)

atra hi paraprakl&d bahirbhiitatve aprak%~m%ratapattiprasaiigiit tatsiddhaye kalpita- pramatradara iti darbayann gha pranety Bdi (MRS, IPV 1.5.7/185: n. 225). W tata& ceivara eva bijabhUmijalibh&&hityeniWrkuWtmanH bhasate, - itiy$n atra paramtithah (2.4.8/11. 146:4-6). X nanu evam ubhayathlpi saqrbhavan%num%nam unmisati, tatra kim makurapratibim- bitaghatldidrstantena jGnapratibimbatabh&avaicitrye vijti%nadarpanHtiriktam tata eva bahyabhimatam hetum kalpayema? kim vH yogidmtfmtena samvitsvatantryam eva hetubhavena bruyiima? tad idam s%$ayikarp vartate iti BSaiikya (1.5.8-9/185:14- 186:4). y na kevalam anantara~lokanirdistabhih yuktibhih pratyaksena bfthyo ‘rtho na abhasate, iyad eva hi pratyaksam - yat n&up bhati iti svaprakL8asamvidruparp nadhikarp kimcit iti, y&at anumLnenlpi na asya b%hyasya siddhih (1.5.8-g/187:3-7). r tatra anumZnam atra naiva pravartitum utsahate / pravrttam api na prakrtasiddham Idadhyat iti. . . tatra anumZnarp - vikalpah, sarvaS ca ayam vikalpo ‘nubhavamiila iti prasiddham / tena yat sarvatha anabhatapiirvam - ananubhtitacararp tatra anumanam anumitivyLp?iro vikalpHtmH naiva kenacit vadinL isyate (1.5.8-g/187:8-15). aa tena anumtiavikalpfrtmanapi prakaSena yadi anavisto niladih arthair tat na anumita . . eva syHt / atha avista eva, tarhi “pnig ivtitho ‘prakHO#t syat” iti nyayena prak&mltra- svabhava eva, na bayah / tena b$tye sadhye yat kirpcit pram@am Bniyate, tadabahyatam eva pratyuta prasadhayati iti viruddham eva (1.5.8-g/191:4-11). bb vartamanatvena sphufataya avabhasanam idam ity evam Lkkam yesam teem, yad


etat bahiratmana - kaIpitam~yiya&inyldi&rImtapram~trp~thagbh~vena hetutu? bhin- nar+, tato mavapramatuh vicchinn?inam ‘avabh%anam’ tat paramgrthapramatari Buddhacinmaye ‘antahsthitavatarn’ tena saha aikatmyam anujjhitavatam eva ‘ghatate’ pramanena upapadyate, tena anujjhitasarpvidabhedasya bhhasya kalpitapramatra- peksay% bhedena prakillanam bhagavato ji%nalaktir uktam bhavati (1.5.1/153: 12- 154:6).

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