Tantric Argument:

·期刊原文
Tantric Argument: The Transfiguration of Philosophical
Discourse in the Pratyabhijna System of Utpaladeva and Abhinavagupta

by Lawrence, David
Philosophy East & West
Vol.46 No.2
Apr. 1996
Pp.165-204
Copyright of University of Hawaii Press

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Introduction

The Enlightenment dichotomy between the detached, universally
intelligible and cogent discourse of science and philosophy
on the one hand and the devout, reasonless, emotional or
mystical discourse of religion on the other has greatly
influenced Western understandings of Indian and other
non-Western philosophies. Wilhelm Halbfass has observed that
Indian philosophy was excluded until recently from most
Western histories of philosophy because of its religious
nature (i.e.,its common purpose of facilitating the pursuit
of salvation)as well as its situation outside the European
historical development of Greek thought. The former has been
viewed to contradict a "twofold concept of freedom"
definitive of philosophy:

1.a freedom from practical interests--from soteriological
motives and from ordinary utilitarian interests; i.e.,
a "purely theoretical" attitude in which knowledge is
sought for its own sake.

2.a freedom from the grip of dogma, from myth, and from
religious and other traditions; i.e., the freedom to
criticize, to think rationally, and to think for
oneself.[1]

This criterion has operated equally in the exclusion from
serious consideration of other non-Western philosophies.

Though for some time abjured by most scholars of non-Western
philosophies, the religion-philosophy dichotomy has continued
to have an insidious influence in a polarization between
religious-historicist and philosophical research
methodologies.[2] The historicist approach ostensibly
overcomes the dichotomy by interpreting in terms of holistic
cultural contexts, usually reducing philosophy to the broadly
religious categories of world view and ritual-ethical
practice. This unification is achieved, however, at the
expense of the rationalist project of philosophy--philosophy
reduced to religion as myth or ritual is no longer seen as
"philosophy."[3] On the other hand, a lot of the best
philosophical work on non-Western philosophies has tended to
abstract discussions of problems of language, epistemology,
and ontology from their functions within religious systems in
comparing them to analogous discussions in the West.[4]

I believe that the modern philosophy-religion dichotomy may
be better overcome by a historically sensitive revision of
the project of philosophical rationalism than by a relativist
or postmodern destruction of philosophy. Looking back, before
the prejudices of the Enlightenment, a more synergistic
conception of the relation of philosophical rationality to
religion is found in our own paradigmatic Greek philosophies.
As Pierre Hadot has shown, most of these were conceived as
systems of "spiritual exercises," in that they aimed at the
conversion (epistropheand metanoia) of the student to a
redemptive understanding of self and universe.[5] Throughout
the long history of Christian philosophy and natural
theology, there have been attempts to use reason to determine
religious truths independently of the assumptions of the
Christian revelation, as an instrument of religious
conversion, or under rubrics such as "faith seeking
understanding."[6] In the still-developing pluralism of the
contemporary academy, there has been a steady increase of
efforts to create dialogue between Western and non-Western,
between religious and nonreligious philosophies--frankly
attempting the mediation of religious claims.[7]

This essay will examine the strong synergism between a
"hard-headed" concern with philosophical justification and
intelligibility on the one hand and soteriology on the other,
in the Pratyabhijna works of the tenth- and eleventh-century
Kashmiri thinkers Utpaladeva and Abhinavagupta.[8] Building
on the initiative of Utpala's teacher Somananda, these two
thinkers created a new, philosophical instrument of
conversion for the Trika tradition of monistic Saivism, to
which I have given the name "tantric argument." Though the
method of this essay is exegetical, I hope it can contribute
to constructive philosophical as well as historical
understandings of the relation of philosophy and religion.[9]

I will first present the originating project of the
Pratyabhijna system as the thinkers' effort to lead all
humanity to salvation. Then I will explain some key features
of the Pratyabhijna methodology. Concerned to achieve greater
intelligibility for their tradition in order to accomplish
their redemptive program, the Saivas appropriate some of the
most widely accepted justificatory procedures of the medieval
Sanskrit philosophical academy. At the same time, however,
they resituate their philosophical discourse within the
traditional Saiva worldview and homologize it to tantric
praxis. Finally, I will sample some of the actual
philosophical arguments implementing this method, in which
the Saivas refute their Buddhist opponents and demonstrate
their central theory of the Lord's self-recognition.

Originating Project of the Pratyabhijna System

The creation of the Pratyabhijna system is said to ensue from
the experience of salvation in the Trika tradition by
Utpaladeva. Its explicit purpose is to lead all humanity to
the same soteriological realization. Utpaladeva explains in
the first verse of the corpus:

Having somehow been caused to obtain servitude [dasya] to
the Great Lord and desiring the benefit [upakara] of
humanity, I am establishing the recognition
[pratyabhijna] of Him, which is the cause of obtaining
all prosperity.[10]

Servitude (dasya)is a widespread Saiva term for a state of
high spiritual realization. Abhinavagupta interprets this
word as indicating Utpaladeva's realization of identity
(tanmayata) with the Supreme Lord.[11] He explains this
realization in a characteristically tantric manner as
comprising the attainment of the Lord's Self-enjoyment
(svatmopabhoga) , and the freedom (svatantrya) to obtain
whatever is desired.[12] The recognition (pratyabhijna)that
Utpaladeva wishes to convey is the very same realization of
identity with Siva, which might be expressed "Indeed I am
that very Lord."[13] This again includes the Lord's
omnipotence and bliss.[14] Its designation as recognition
articulates the Saivas' actual philosophical theory, which
will be taken up later.

The word "humanity" (jana)addresses the sastraic question of
eligibility for studying the system. Abhinavagupta interprets
the term as indicating "those who are afflicted by incessant
birth and death" and who "as objects of compassion, should be
helped."[15] He explains that Utpaladeva's general reference
means that there is no restriction regarding those who are
eligible, not even of caste.[16] It is unlikely that
Utpaladeva and Abhinavagupta really believed that all
humanity would read these texts composed in the elite
language of Sanskrit. Nevertheless, I believe that we should
extend the hermeneutic charity of taking the Saivas seriously
as intending their work to be of benefit to people outside
their tradition.[17] This intention is crucial to the
discursive methodology that they develop.

The Pratyabhijna Methodology

Because the Pratyabhijna sastra attempts to bring about
salvation, it is in numerous places described as a spiritual
means or path (upaya,marga, patha). Abhinava describes the
Pratyabhijna as a specifically Trika method, as "a means for
the goal of the Person who is the Witness, who is none other
than Anuttara."[18] Anuttara, 'not having a superior', is one
of the important Trika designations for Ultimate Reality.
Utpaladeva refers to the means taught by Somananda and
himself as a "new, easy path." Abhinava's explanation of the
path's novelty is interesting. He states that "[the word]
"new" signifies that it is contained in all the sacred texts
but not well known because of concealment."[19] Abhinava is
here giving the common hermeneutic device of grounding
innovation in the implicit or potential significance of a
tradition a distinctively tantric character of secrecy. In
various places the Pratyabhijna is described specifically as
a means working through knowledge (jnanopaya).[20]

The Pratyabhijna thinkers' understanding of the manner in
which this means works is remarkably complex. They
appropriate procedures of philosophical justification from
outside their tradition while at the same time reinterpreting
them with their own symbolic and practical resources.[21] In
this section I will first present theological and
meta-physical considerations adduced by them that in the
highest perspective controvert the possibility of any
methodology regarding the Supreme Lord. Then I will turn to
the Saivas' appropriation of the classic justificatory
methods of Nyaya. I will show how, at the same time they
utilize these methods of detached rational discourse, they
homologize them with procedures of tantric praxis.

Negations of Methodology. The Saiva formulations of procedure
are immediately interrupted by reflections upon what I would
describe--with our own terminology--as a fundamental
religious problematic. I would describe this problematic most
broadly as the possibility or utility of any finite human
behavior, whether linguistic, aesthetic, theological,
devotional, ritual, and so on, for expressing, affecting, or
attaining a religious Ultimate Reality.[22] For the
Pratyabhijna this human-Ultimate "structural" issue has two
aspects--coming from its nature as both a theistic and a
fully monistic system.

First, Siva is the omnipotent deity, responsible for
everything that occurs.[23] How can a limited human being
bring about identification with Him? Abhinavagupta discusses
the familiar questions of divine will, grace, and finite
human action in several of his works. He acknowledges that
one may consider the most favorable conditions for, or
actions of, an aspirant for salvation. At the same time, he
states emphatically that in the ultimate perspective
salvation is entirely accomplished by the divine will. The
favorable conditions do not in any way cause the grace of
Siva.[24]

Abhinava makes the same argument at various places in the
Pratyabhijna texts, although not at length. Thus he takes
this issue up when explaining the use of the causative in the
gerund "having been caused to attain" (asadya)in Utpaladeva's
introductory verse quoted above. Abhinava explains that the
Lord does everything. His grace is therefore unattainable
even by means of hundreds of wishes. It is because of the
obfuscation of its real nature that actual causation by the
Lord appears as ordinary observed causal relationships, such
as the relation between means and goal (upayopeyabhava),
accomplisher and accomplished (nispadyanispadakabhava), and
that which makes known and that which is made known
(jnapyajnapakabhava).According to Abhinava, the unconditioned
nature of the Lord's grace is indicated by the adverb
"somehow" (kathamcit) modifying "having been caused to
attain."[25]

It is to the second aspect of the human-Ultimate structural
tension that the Pratyabhijna thinkers devote most of their
reflection. At the same time that the Ultimate Reality is
understood in "super-" personal terms as the deity Siva,
rather than as an impersonal principle, it is understood to
contain all reality in a pure unity. If the Ultimate Reality
is nondual, the structure and cognitive presumptiveness of
its realization must be fundamentally different from ordinary
experience, which comprises dichotomies between subject and
object, and between different subjects and objects, and takes
place as a process in time. It would be impossible for Him to
be a mere cognitive object (prameya)established by sastraic
discourse.

The Saivas develop the Advaita Vedantin concept of
self-luminosity (svaprakasatva)to explain how Siva always
already has a nondual realization of Himself.[26] Putting
their convoluted discussions of this concept in a more linear
fashion, the thinkers deny that (1)any cognizer (pramatr)(2)
by any means (pramana)could have (3)any cognition (prama,
pramiti)or proof (siddhi)--ofwhich the object (prameya)is the
Supreme Lord. Like Advaita, they explain the operation of the
sastra negatively as only removing the ignorance of this
self-luminosity.[27] The following explanation by
Abhinavagupta brings together this point with the other
negation of methodology in terms of divine omnipotence; it is
the Lord who both creates and removes His self-concealment:

Nothing new is accomplished. Nor is what is really not
shining [aprakasamana] illuminated [prakasyate]. [Rather]
the supposition [abhimanana] that what is shining is not
shining is removed. For liberation, which is the
attainment of the state of the Supreme Lord, is nothing
but the removal of that [false supposition]. The cycle of
suffering in rebirth [samsara] is nothing but the
nonremoval of that. Both of these [conditions of
liberation and rebirth] are in essence only supposition.
And both are manifested by the Blessed One.[28]

The Pratyabhijna thinkers' denials of the efficacy of human
thought and action, like other such qualifications in the
world's religions, do not prevent them from engaging in
elaborate positive discussions of methodology. These negative
formulations may accordingly be taken as "dialectically
complicating" their more positive descriptions. What is
important for us is that in delimiting their new
philosophical procedures from the point of view of Ultimate
Reality, the thinkers are from the start carefully preserving
their intratraditional integrity. Though the Saiva
soteriological realization will be entered into the game of
methodologically detached interreligious debate, it is
already the winner.

Positive Formulations of Methodology: (a)The Pursuit of
Universal Intelligibility: The Methodological Standards of
Nyaya. It is the Pratyabhijna thinkers' goal of sharing the
Trika spiritual vision with all humanity that motivates their
development of a philosophical method. For, in order that
those outside their tradition may accept it, its validity
must be intelligible to them. The Saiva effort in this
respect has its parallel in the more rationalistic strain of
Western philosophical theology and philosophy of religion.

The Catholic theologian David Tracy has analyzed the
discourse of philosophical theology, which he calls
fundamental theology, in a manner addressing problems of
cross-cultural/interreligious interpretation and rationality.
Philosophical theology is primarily addressed to, follows the
standards, and addresses the substantive concerns of the
academy. Thus, although it may argue on behalf of a
particular religious tradition, it is methodologically
detached from the religious and ethical commitments and
presumptions regarding truth of other forms of theology
(systematicand practical):

In terms of modes of argument, fundamental theologies
will be concerned principally to provide arguments that
all reasonable persons, whether "religiously involved" or
not, can recognize as reasonable. It assumes, therefore,
the most usual meaning of public discourse: that
discourse available (inprinciple) to all persons and
explicated by appeals to one's experience, intelligence,
rationality and responsibility, and formulated in
arguments where claims are stated with appropriate
warrants, backings and rebuttal procedures.[29]

We may say that in the broad sastraic "academy," there also
developed a "philosophy division," analogous to those in the
West and other cultures. In this sphere, the diverse schools
of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism have attempted to argue
for their positions not simply by citing scriptural authority
but by using reasoning (yukti,tarka, etc.).[30] Each school
maintained its own "intratraditional" point of view about
what it was doing, whether it was apologetics to convert,
means to allay the doubts of their own followers, or
spiritual exercise.

Though differences always remained, there emerged a number of
convergences about methods and experiential and rational
criteria for philosophical justification spanning the various
Indian schools. The most widely accepted argumentative
standards in India were those developed by the
Nyaya-Vaisesika tradition. Gautama summarized these standards
in sixteen categories pertaining to philosophical discussion
at Nyaya Sutra 1.1, and these were elaborated with ever
greater sophistication in later commentaries.[31]

Though in the truest perspective the Pratyabhijna system does
not do anything, when it comes to positive discussions of
philosophical methodology, Abhinavagupta asserts that it
adheres to the standards of Nyaya: "There is the correctness
only of the method of the Naiyayikas in the condition of
Maya."[32] He explains the very power of the system to
convince others on the basis of its addressing the Nyaya
categories:

The ultimate purpose in that [sastra] is nothing but
[explanation in terms of] the sixteen categories, such as
the means of cognition [pramana], and so on.... When the
sixteen categories are articulated [nirupyamanesu],
another is made to understand completely that which is to
be understood.[33]

The sixteen Nyaya categories enumerate a variety of concerns
which must be addressed in philosophical discussions. They
refer to items of different orders and are somewhat
overlapping in their significance, including the broad topics
of means of knowledge (pramana)and objects of knowledge
(prameya),roughly corresponding to our fields of epistemology
and ontology; a classification of types of philosophical
debates and of the criteria operative in this classification;
and an enumeration of the formal requirements of a
well-rounded philosophical discussion.[34] Within the
Naiyayikas' own soteriological project, the categories are
oriented toward the comprehension of particular objects of
knowledge (prameya).Knowledge of and the elimination of error
regarding relevant objects of knowledge, particularly as
pertaining to what is and is not the true self, leads to
detachment and liberation from suffering in rebirth.[35]

The Nyaya categories are in various ways explicitly and
implicitly addressed in the Pratyabhijna system. However, two
categories receive the greatest emphasis in the construction
of the Pratyabhijna philosophical method. We will now examine
how these categories are appropriated. I will devote the
greatest attention to the most important of these, the schema
for argument (avayava).Then I will more briefly explain the
Saivas' treatment of the Nyaya category of doubt (samsaya).In
taking up each category, we will first consider how it is
utilized in the Pratyabhijna effort to achieve more universal
intelligibility. Then we will observe how the employment of
each in the Pratyabhijna is given its deepest significance as
spiritual exercise, by its homologization both with earlier
patterns of tantric praxis and with a particular
classification of praxis developed by Abhinava. In each case
I will present only the minimum substance of the Pratyabhijna
arguments necessary to get a programmatic understanding of
their method; I will give an idea of the actual arguments in
the last section.

Positive Formulations of Methodology: (b) Philosophical
Rationalization with the Nyaya Schema for Argument: Inference
for the Sake of Others. The Nyaya category most emphasized by
Abhinavagupta is the schema for argument (avayava).This
schema presents the steps of the Nyaya 'inference for the
sake of others' (pararthanumana) .In Indianthere is a
distinction between two types of inference, that for the sake
of oneself (svarthanumana)and that for the sake of others.
The latter is given a rigorously explicit formulation in
order to make logical justification from experiential and
conceptual evidence assessable by any critical person.
Abhinava explains that sastra "has the nature of an inference
for the sake of others (parararthanumana) ."[36]Its
intelligibility results directly from its being constructed
according to the Nyaya category:

What is the purpose with respect to the other? This
[work] is for comprehension by the other. And there is
that from the inference for the sake of others.... It has
been explained by the founder of Nyaya, Aksapada, that
every academic text [sastra] apart from scripture really
consists of the inference for the sake of others, and
[thus] brings about complete comprehension by the
other.[37]

I will first outline the Nyaya inference for the sake of
others, using the common example of the inference of fire
from smoke. This inference has five steps and five terms.[38]
In the following, the numbered items are the steps; the other
expressions given are the terms.[39] (1)Thesis (pratijna):
There is fire on the hill. The hill is the subject (paksa)of
the inference. The fire is that which is to be established
(sadhya) pertaining to it. (2)Reason (hetu):Because there is
smoke. The smoke itself, like the inferential step that
invokes it, is also designated with the word 'reason' (hetu).
It is a property found in the subject, and known to be
concomitant with that which is to be established. As such it
is the justification for the inference. (3)General principle
with exemplification (udaharana):Where there is smoke there
is fire, like in the kitchen and unlike on the lake. This
step explains the concomitance underlying the reason. The
kitchen is the positive example illustrating the concomitance
(sapaksa).The lake is the negative example (vipaksa),showing
that the property does not have concomitance with a class
wider than that which is to be established. (Thisterm is
usually not cited by the Saivas.)(4) Application (upanaya):
The hill, because it has smoke on it, has fire on it. This
step explicitly asserts that the subject falls within
concomitance shown by the previous step. (5) Conclusion
(nigamana):Therefore there is fire on the hill. This repeats
the thesis as established.

We must now get a programmatic understanding of the
Pratyabhijna version of this inference abstracted from the
technical details of the theories which actually articulate
it. The proposition which the Pratyabhijna inference
demonstrates is that of the soteriological recognition, that
is, that one is identical with the Lord.[40] The subject
(paksa)of the thesis is the person, and what is to be
established (sadhya)is that he or she is the Lord.

The justification for the connection between the subject and
what is to be established is made by the reason step in the
inference. This step is supposed to identify a quality (the
reason term)in the subject, which is known to be invariably
concomitant with that which is to be established. The most
distinctive fact known about Siva is expressed in the
cosmogonic myth. That is, Siva emanates the universe through
His power and consort Sakti, whose identity with Himself is
described as sexual union. The reason in the Pratyabhijna
inference is precisely that the individual is the actor in
the cosmogonic myth of emanation.

The Saivas articulate this reason, that the individual is
emanator of the universe, through their actual technical
philosophical discussions. They also describe it with a
variety of ad hoc figurative expressions, some of which will
be seen below. However, in programmatic discussions of
Pratyabhijna methodology, they give it two chief expressions,
which we will take up presently. The first expression of the
inferential reason is simply that the individual possesses
Sakti. As Utpaladeva states in the second verse of the
sastra:

This recognition of Him, who though experienced is not
noticed due to the force of delusion, is made to be
experienced through the revealing of [His] Sakti
[saktyaviskarana].[41]

In this formulation, Sakti Herself is the reason as
constituent term of the reason step.[42]

In technical philosophical discussions, Sakti is often
divided into special modalities that designate Siva's
emanatory power as operative in the respective spheres of
explanation. The two most encompassing forms of Sakti are the
Cognition (jnana)Sakti and the Action (kriya)Sakti, which are
invoked in the fields roughly corresponding to epistemology
and ontology.[43] These two are further divided into a number
of Saktis pertaining to subsidiary topics.[44]

Speaking abstractly, the demonstration that the individual
possesses the emanatory Sakti operative in a particular
sphere is made by an idealistic reduction of aft its features
to modalities of his or her subjectivity. This is brought out
in a concise formulation by Utpaladeva:

There is the establishment [pratistha] of insentient
entities as grounded in living beings [jivadasraya]. The
life of living beings is maintained to be the [Saktis of]
Cognition and Action.[45]

Abhinavagupta explains that by "living beings" Utpaladeva
means subjects (pramatr).These include all apparently limited
subjects, from a worm to the gods Brahma and Sadasiva. The
system demonstrates that the very existence of objects is the
subject's exercise of cognition and action over them.[46]

The conception that one is the emanator of the universe,
which forms the inferential reason, is also described as a
special kind of insight called Pure Wisdom (suddhavidya).Pure
Wisdom is the awareness that one is the source emanating all
objective reality as identical with oneself. This awareness
is given the typical linguistic expression "I am this" (aham
idam).[47] According to Abhinava, the following statement by
Utpaladeva explains why this wisdom (vidya)is pure:

Things which have fallen to the level of objects of
cognition and are understood in the condition of "this"
are essentially consciousness [bodha]; and are [through
Pure Wisdom] seen as they really are.[48]

Such knowledge is pure because it is an awareness of the
ostensible essential nature of objects as one's
emanation.[49]

The third step of the inference states the concomitance of
Siva with His character as emanator, that is, Sakti, and so
on, and gives examples demonstrating this concomitance. The
fourth explicitly asserts that the individual falls within
this concomitance. The conclusion reiterates the thesis that
the individual is actually the Lord. The entire inference
will be further clarified by the presentation and explication
of some informal summaries of it by Abhinavagupta.

In our first summary, the reason is formulated directly in
terms of the Cognition and Action modalities of Sakti. Two
supporting examples are mentioned: the Lord Siva Himself, as
known in sacred literature, and the king, who like the Lord
Siva, knows and acts over all his subjects. Abhinava
explains:

The subject [pramatr], because he is endowed with the
Cognition and Action Saktis, is to be understood
[vyavahartavya] as the Lord, like the Lord who is well
known in the Puranas, scriptures, and so on. Even if He
is not well known [from such texts], Lordship is
established to have the nature of the possession of the
Cognition and Action Saktis over all objects. For
[Lordship] is invariably associated with nothing but
these [two Saktis]. Thus the logical concomitance is
understood in the case of one such as a king, who is
regarded as Lord. Like the king, one is the Lord over so
much as one is the cognizer and doer. It is contradictory
to the nature of one who is not the Lord to be a cognizer
and a doer. And the Self is cognizer and doer with regard
to everything. Thus recognition [pratyabhijna] is
established.[50]

This may be put formally as follows: (1)The subject is the
Lord. (2) Because he/she has the Cognition and Action Saktis.
(3)Whoever has Cognition and Action Saktis is Lord. Like the
Lord known in the Puranas and scriptures, and like the king.
(4)The subject, since he/she has them, is the Lord. (5)The
subject is the Lord.

The following example is similar to that just given but
describes the relationship of individual and universe in
terms of dependence: "He who is depended on somewhere is the
Lord, like a king over his domain. So does the universe
[depend on] you."[51] Formally: (1)You are the Lord. (2)
Because the universe depends on you. (3)He/she who is
depended on somewhere is the Lord. Like the king over his
domain. (4)You, on whom the universe depends, are the Lord.
(5)Therefore, you are the Lord.

Several expressions by Abhinavagupta do not even mention the
Lord as the inferential predicate but establish that the
individual has divine status in other ways. Thus the
following demonstrates that one is the pervader of the
universe because he/she contains it:

That in which something manifests is the pervader
[vyapakah] of so much, like a casket regarding jewels.
The universe, beginning with the earth and ending with
Sadasiva, as has been explained by the sastra,
[manifests] in you who have the nature of
consciousness.[52]

We analyze: (1)You are the pervader of the universe. (2)
Because in you there is the manifestation of the universe.
(3)That in which something manifests is the pervader of so
much. Like a casket regarding jewels. (4) You, in whom the
universe manifests, are the pervader of the universe. (5)
Therefore, you are the pervader of the universe, beginning
with the earth and ending with Sadasiva.

I hope these examples have given a sufficient general view of
the Pratyabhijna methodological program as structured by the
Nyaya inference for the sake of others.[53] By submitting
their soteriological vision to this academic regimen, the
Saivas are in a sense suspending their assumptions of its
validity in order to demonstrate its cogency on
extra-traditional grounds.[54]

Positive Formulations of Methodology: (c)The Encompassment of
the Inference for the Sake of Others within Tantric Praxis.
At the same time, the Pratyabhijna thinkers understand what
they are doing with this inference in intratraditional terms.
From this perspective, the Pratyabhijna formulation of the
Nyaya inference gets its deepest significance as following
the patterns of earlier and contemporaneous tantric praxis.

To proceed, the approach to Siva through Sakti or other
representations of His emanatory power is an ancient and
pervasive tradition.[55] Some of the most important
expressions of this approach are found in Krama tantrism,
where a number of rituals and contemplations aim to give the
aspirant the realization of himself as the Lord over circles
of Saktis in the form of Kalis (sakticakra).There was also a
later development of approaches to Siva through His emanation
in the form of 'creative vibration' (spanda).[56]

I will cite two examples of an approach to Siva through his
emanation prescribed in the scripture Vijnana Bhairava, which
vividly present the traditional background to the
Pratyabhijna inference:

There is always nondifference between Sakti and the
possessor of Sakti [i.e., Siva]. Since She is thus the
possessor of His qualities, She is the Supreme [para]
Sakti of the Supreme Self [paratman]. [Similarly] the
burning power [sakti] of fire is not considered to be
different from fire. There is this [the analysis of power
and possessor of power] only as a beginning in entering
into the state of knowledge. If one who has entered into
the condition of Sakti would meditate on their
nondifference, he would come to have the nature of Siva.
Siva's consort [Saivi] is explained here to be the door.
Dear, just as different places, and so on, are cognized
by means of the light of a lamp and the rays of the sun,
so is Siva [cognized] by means of Sakti.[57]

The second passage is even more interesting. This passage
refers to Siva's character of emanating the world without
using the word "Sakti." However, it mentions the two
fundamental modalities of Sakti, Cognition and Action, which
organize the Pratyabhijna texts:

One can become Siva from the firm conviction: "The
Supreme Lord is all-cognizer [sarvajna], all-doer
[sarvakartr], and pervasive. I, who have the qualities
[dharma] of Siva, am none but He. Just as the waves
belong to the water, the flames belong to a fire, and
light belongs to the sun, these waves[58] of the universe
belong to Bhairava, who is none but me."[59]

This contemplation is remarkably similar to the later
Pratyabhijna inference. One understands oneself as Siva
because of having his distinctive character of emanation.[60]
The use of the Nyaya category has only elucidated the
"rationality" already contained in a traditional practice.
The post-Abhinavagupta commentator Sivopadhyaya, looking
backwards through the philosophical interpretation,
explicitly identifies this passage as describing the
contemplation of Pratyabhijna.[61]

The spiritual significance of the Pratyabhijna inference is
not limited to its reenactment of earlier tantric practices.
This inference fits within one of the classifications of
spiritual means, systematized by Abhinavagupta in his
Tantraloka and Tantrasara, called the sakta upaya.[62] As I
have just observed, the commentator Sivopadhyaya identifies
the last-quoted passage of the Vijnana Bhairava as describing
the contemplation of Pratyabhijna. In the same explanation,
he also classifies this contemplation within the sakta
upaya.[63]

The two programmatic formulations of the conception that is
the reason step in the Pratyabhijna inference, the revealing
of Sakti and Pure Wisdom, are in fact the most definitive
methodological themes of the sakta upaya. Thus the special
importance of the revealing of Sakti in this upaya is
indicated by its very name.[64] As Navjivan Rastogi has
explained:

The element of Sakti permeates all these three in varying
measures and is characterized variously as gross, subtle,
ultimate, etc., as the case may be. But it is the
superabundance of Sakti because of which this Upaya is
called Sakta.[65]

It is in the chapters of the Tantraloka and Tantrasara
presenting the sakta upaya that Abhinavagupta develops a
Trika appropriation of the Krama procedure of meditating on
one's Lordship over circles of Saktis.[66] Abhinava describes
the revealing of Sakti in the sakta upaya in terms of the
same modalities of Cognition and Action that are the foci of
the Pratyabhijna arguments:

There is the condition of conceptual constructions in the
sakta [means]. In that [state], [the Saktis of] acting
and cognizing are evident. However, according to the
previous reasoning, there is a contraction of them. To
the one occupied with destroying all of this contraction,
there is revealed blazing Sakti, which brings about the
desired internal illumination.[67]

Perhaps more distinctive than the revealing of Sakti per se
is Abhinavagupta's consolidation in the sakta upaya of
developing understandings of the religious function of
intellectual activity.[68] The sakta upaya is the
classification of the means based upon knowledge
(jnanopaya) .[69]We have already observed that the
Pratyabhijna system is described as a means of knowledge by
both Utpaladeva and Abhinavagupta.

Abhinavagupta thus describes the modus operandi of the sakta
upaya gnoseologically as the 'purification of
conceptualization' (vikalpasamskara) .The quintessential
"tool" of the purification of conceptualization, and thereby
of the sakta upaya, is good or true reasoning
(sat-tarka) .[70]Reasoning was increasingly seen as a
spiritual means in scriptures before Abhinavagupta. Of the
greatest importance for Abhinavagupta were the assessments of
reasoning in his most revered Trika scripture, the
Malinivijaya Tantra. This scripture itself tantricizes Indian
academic traditions in explaining the soteriological role of
reasoning as the discrimination which encourages the movement
from that which is to be abandoned (heya)to that which is to
be pursued (upadeya).[71]

In his sakta upaya, Abhinavagupta identifies these two
categories, respectively, with the impure and pure kinds of
conceptualization. Now, the distinguishing characteristic
which makes one pure rather than the other is whether or not
there is apprehended the absorption of the objective universe
into the emanatory subject:

The impurity called supreme is the idea which
distinguishes from Siva these [things] which really have
Him as their nature. Purity is the destruction of this
idea....[72]

As the goal of this process, Abhinava posits a principle
found in a number of Saiva cosmological schemes. This is none
other than the conception with which we are already familiar,
Pure Wisdom, that is, the awareness of emanation expressed "I
am this [universe]."[73]

Abhinava also identifies this goal of Pure Wisdom with the
tool leading toward it, good reasoning: "Good reasoning is
nothing but Pure Wisdom... ." [74] Pure Wisdom may thus be
understood as the insight that informs, and leads toward
itself, the purification of conceptualization. The following
passage gives an idea of the overall process:

The multitude of things appear clearly in that jewel [the
Self/Lord], who is pure, and has omnipotent freedom
[svatantra]. That [conceptual construction] is said to be
benighted [and is impure] which comprehends
differentiation between [those things] and the Self.
However [there is also conceptual construction] having
the nature of Pure Wisdom, which comprehends the Self as
containing all objects [as is expressed]: "I am all
this." This conceptual construction has the nature of
Pure Wisdom and is clearly manifest; it destroys the
mayic conceptual construction which causes
differentiation.[75]

Thus we see that both formulations of the Pratyabhijna
inferential rationale are also the central practical themes
of the sakta upaya. I do not wish to claim, however, that the
upaya is nothing but the inference. The two methodological
themes in the sakta upaya include a variety of other
practices, including nonphilosophical studies of sacred
scriptures and discussions of them with gurus, and elaborate
meditations on mandalas. Abhinava formulates the upaya to
encompass the Pratyabhijna argumentation along with these
other practices.[76]

Positive Formulations of Methodology: (d)The Philosophical
and Tantric Encounter with Doubt. We may now more briefly
consider the Pratyabhijna thinkers' appropriation of one
other Nyaya category, that of doubt (samsaya).According to
Nyaya, philosophy proceeds by first considering doubt or
indecision regarding a view. It then utilizes the inference
for the sake of others and other procedures of debate to
reach a justified decision (nirnaya).[77]

Most Indian philosophical texts are structured as a series of
statements, questions, and answers expressing the views of
opponents (purvapaksa--the 'prima facie')in confrontation
with the position being established (siddhanta--the
'established conclusion'). In the IPK and its commentaries,
the whole second chapter is devoted to an initial
presentation of the views of opponents. The discussions are
developed further as the proponents argue their response in
the remainder of the book.

The Nyaya requirement for the consideration of doubt may be
taken as coming from the cognizance of the integrality of
"otherness" to philosophical rationality. The effort to
justify one's views, or to make their ostensible validity
more universally intelligible, requires an awareness of
alternative possibilities. Abhinavagupta again is explicit
about the intelligibility accomplished through the effort of
answering doubt:

The nature of Ultimate Reality here [in this system] is
explained through the consideration of the views of
opponents as doubts and the refutation of them; it is
thus very clearly manifested.[78]

Given the Saivas' redemptive-apologetic project, it should
not be surprising that they do not understand alternative
views as truly viable options. They attempt to reencompass
the otherness of philosophical opposition within their
traditional categories. This is illustrated by
Abhinavagupta's benedictory verse to the chapter presenting
the views of the opponents:

We pay obeisance to Siva, who manifests the
differentiated universe as the prima facie argument, and
then leads it back to unity as the established
conclusion.[79]

Here Abhinava is interpreting the process of philosophical
debate with the mythical understanding that the Lord produces
both delusion and revelation for humanity. Shortly after this
benediction, Abhinavagupta quotes for support a statement
from a devotional work, the Stavacintamani of Bhatta
Narayana, which more generally describes these acts:

Homage to God [deva] who creating the delusion of the
deluded who are within worldly existence, destroys it;
and concealing the transoppositional bliss of cognition,
uncovers it.[80]

We know that Siva ultimately does everything. Nevertheless,
corresponding to the mythical identification, the elimination
of philosophical opposition is also encompassed within
tantric practice. Thus in Abhinava's discussions of the sakta
upaya, he polemically makes opponent doctrines an object of
the purification of conceptualization. He states that the
path to be abandoned [heya] is the means to liberation taught
by other systems.[81] Among those whom Abhinava mentions are
Buddhists, Jains, Vaisnavas, Vaidikas, and Samkyas.[82]
Blinded by maya, these schools lack good reasoning and do not
understand the purification of conceptualization
(vikalpasamskara) .[83]However, through purifying their
reasoning, those who follow other schools can be saved:

Even one who [because of karma] has developed within
those [wrong systems] can come to be discriminating about
his rising judgments [paramarsa]. Due to the excellence
of Pure Wisdom, he is purified by the descent of Sakti
[saktipata, a way of describing mystical grace], and
ascends the good path, from which the obstacles have been
removed.[84]

In one of his final comments in the IPV, Abhinava asserts
that the Pratyabhijna sastra makes the views of various other
systems help bring about the recognition of the Self, as the
sun unites the essences (rasa)of earth and water for the
nourishment of grains.[85] From the Saivas' point of view,
they are purifying conceptualizations to reflect their
tantric metaphysics. This self-understanding also has a
rhetorical consequence. As will be illustrated in the next
section, the Saivas' arguments attempt thoroughly to subvert
the views of their opponents in establishing their own.

The Implementation of Tantric Argument

The explanation of the Pratyabhijna methodology that has just
been given has been confined to formulations of a
programmatic nature. To understand it more deeply, we must
turn to their technical philosophical discussions. It is not
possible to present a detailed analysis of such discussions
here. I will only give an overview of the chief
implementation of the Saiva method in the arena of
epistemology, that is, the philosophy of the recognition of
the Lord.[86]

The Challenge of the Buddhist Logicians. Following protocol,
we must first turn to the challenge of the Saivas' opponents.
Though they deal with various rivals, the Saivas' chief
opponents are the school now often called "Buddhist logic,"
which was founded by Dignaga and most influentially
interpreted by Dharmakirti.[87] Buddhist logic develops two
soteriological emphases of early Buddhism--on the
transitoriness of all things and on the dangers inherent in
speculation--into a critical philosophy that has often been
compared with the phenomenalism of David Hume.

Buddhist logic formulates a radical distinction and disaccord
between (1) a series of evanescent flashes of direct
perception lacking all conceptualization
(nirvikalpakajnana) --ofevanescent svalaksanas,
'self-characterized', 'unique particulars', or 'point
instants' and (2) cognition, which includes vikalpa (i.e.,
savikalpakajnana), that is, all imaginative, conceptual, and
linguistic interpretation, which synthesizes the unique
particulars into ostensible objects characterized by
universals (samanyalaksana) .Now, while the Buddhists
acknowledge that this interpretation has a kind of
provisional validity for ordinary behavior in the world, they
contend that it is ultimately unfounded in immediate
experience and is invalid.[88]

In polemics spanning several centuries before the
Pratyabhijna sastra, the Buddhist logicians attempted to
refute or "deconstruct" as invalid generalizations of
evanescent experiences many of the commonsensical and
religiously significant conceptions held by the Hindu
schools--external objects, ordinary as well as ritual action,
an enduring Self, God, the sacred language of revelation, and
so forth. A particular development in the debates was crucial
in defining the immediate intellectual problematics which the
Pratyabhijna thinkers attempted to resolve in their
philosophical theology. The entire process of interpreting
experience came to be viewed by both Buddhists and Hindus to
be epitomized in the experience of recognition
(pratyabhijna).

Recognition in ordinary life is understood as the realization
that an object of a present experience is the same as an
object of a past experience, as retained in the memory. It
has the typical expression "This is that." The same process
actually occurs in all applications of interpretation to
experience. In our memory are stored the semantic conventions
(samketa)regarding the words that we use in interpretation.
We apply interpretations to experience when the relevant
mnemonic impressions (samskara) are activated. Thus, all
applications of interpretation, which in contemporary Western
philosophy are described as "seeing as, " came to be
understood as comprising the "This is that" structure of a
very general sort of recognition.[89]

The Buddhists claimed that this process of recognition is
invalid. They argued that memory has no epistemic relevance
to present direct experience. Their most energetic Hindu
opponents, the realist schools of Nyaya-Vaisesika and Purva
Mimamsa, argued that our recognitive seeing-as is grounded
in, and elucidates, a world of genuinely independent objects
possessing intrinsic qualities.[90]

Now it is possible to appreciate why the Saivas formulate the
soteriological realization that they wish to convey as a kind
of recognition. They deliberately set it up as having the
recognitive structure of interpretation that has been
problematized by the Buddhists. In this regard, I must also
point out that in Indian philosophy inference itself, as an
interpretation, was understood to operate through a kind of
recognitive judgment (lirigaparamarsa, pratisamdhana) .
Inference is the application of the knowledge--or memory--of
a concomitance to a case presently at hand.[91] For the
Pratyabhijna, we have a memory from scriptures and other
sources of the Lord Siva as causing the emanation of the
universe, possessing Sakti, and so on. One applies this
memory to the direct experience of one's own self, as is
expressed in the statement "Indeed I am that very Lord."[92]

The Saivas' interpretation of the challenge of the Buddhists
to their soteriological recognition is oriented toward the
structure of the Pratyabhijna inference for the sake of
others.[93] The Buddhists attack the overarching recognition
by attacking the recognitions of the inference's key terms
along with their entailments: Self; Cognition as a faculty,
which it must be to be a Sakti; Action as enduring process,
again which it must be to be a Sakti; and the very
possibility of relation, which Cognition and Action would
have to have with the Self in order to be Saktis. The
Buddhist contention is that, as there are no grounds for
recognizing these categories in the flux of unique
particulars, there are no grounds for the Saiva
soteriological recognition.[94]

The Saiva Response to the Buddhists. How do the Saivas answer
this sweeping doubt, metaphysically subvert Buddhist logic,
and establish the inference leading to the soteriological
recognition? Their response may be understood as a highly
creative development of the thought of the
fourth-to-sixth-century linguistic philosopher
Bhartrhari.[95] Bartrhari had interpreted the Vedic
revelation metaphysically as the Word Absolute (sabdabrahman)
or Supreme Speech (paravak) .[96]This principle is a
superlinguistic plenum containing language and reality in a
unity and emanating into the universe of separated words and
objects. Bhartrhari's postulation of this principle as the
source makes the entire universe of experience inherently
linguistic, and thus provides the ground for the
re-connection of words and objects in conventional linguistic
reference.[97] His basic position is diametrically opposed to
that of the Buddhists.[98]

Utpaladeva and Abhinavagupta interpret Supreme Speech as
Siva's very self-recognition (ahampratyavamarsa) .[99]
Extending Bhartrhari's approach to the new problematics, they
explain their cosmogonic myth of Siva emanating the universe
through Sakti as this process of His self-recognition. As
Abhinavagupta puts it:

The Supreme Lord, who has the nature of awareness, makes
His own Self into an object of cognition, even though it
is not an object of cognition, because the Cognizer is
unitary.... As He recognitively apprehends [paramrsati]
His Self, so, because everything is contained within Him,
He appears as blue, and so on.[100]

The emanation of the recognitions of discrete objects such as
"blue" is understood as a kind of fragmentation of the Lord's
self-recognition. In this process, there is first the pure
monistic self-recognition "I." Then there is a recognition
involving a partial differentiation of objectivity from
subjectivity, having the structure we know as Pure Wisdom,
that is, "I am this." Finally, there is the loss of the
awareness of the "I" in the recognition of apparently
separate objects as "This," or, more fully, "This is that,"
"This is blue," and so on.[101]

Siva's self-recognition is, of course, the very realization
that the Saivas aim to convey to humanity. The Pratyabhijna
thinkers' ascription of a primordial, cosmogonic status to it
is of great import in their arguments with the Buddhists.
They are thereby able to argue that their system's goal
constitutes the very facts that the Buddhists say preclude
it. As the Saivas' speculation alleges the necessity of the
Lord's self-recognition as the underlying reality of the
basic epistemological and ontological facts, it may be
classified as a highly ambitious form of transcendental
inquiry.[102]

According to the Saivas, just as the Lord's self-recognition
emanates into the recognitions of apparently discrete
objects, it emanates into different types of experiences of
such objects. The chief among these are perceptual cognition,
memory, and conceptual exclusion (apohana).In their treatment
of epistemology, Utpaladeva and Abhinavagupta attempt to
reduce these processes as well as their ostensible objects to
modalities of Siva's self-recognition.[103]

Here it will be possible to give a brief summary of the
Saivas' treatment of only one topic of epistemology, which, I
believe, is most representative: perceptual cognition. The
Saivas' arguments on perceptual cognition may be roughly
divided into those centered on the term prakasa and those
centered on the term vimarsa and its cognates such as
pratyavamarsa, paramarsa, and so on. Though contemporary
scholarship has given much attention to these terms, I do not
believe there has been a basic appreciation of the way the
discussions employing them function to articulate the Saivas'
argumentative and rederuptive agendas of leading students to
the soteriological recognition.[104]

Prakasa, 'light, illumination' or 'awareness', has the
philosophical significance, preliminary to the Saivas'
arguments about it, of a kind of subjective awareness that
validates each cognition, so that one knows that one
knows.[105] The thrust of the arguments about prakasa is
idealistic.[106] The Saivas contend that, as no object is
known without this validating subjective awareness, this
awareness constitutes all objects:

If the object did not have the nature of awareness
[prakasa], it would be without illumination [aprakasa],
as it was before [its appearance]. Awareness [prakasa]
cannot be different [than the object]. Awareness
[prakasata] is the essential nature of the object.[107]

Nor can objects external to awareness be inferred as the
causes of the diversity of awareness. For inference can only
be made regarding things which have already been experienced,
and not objects which by definition can never have been
experienced.[108]

Furthermore, the Saivas contend that one could never
experience another subject outside one's own awareness.
However, their conclusion is not solipsism as usually
understood in the West, but a conception of a universal
awareness:

Even the cognition of others is nothing but one's own
Self. Otherness is entirely due to accidental attributes
[upadhi] such as the body, and so on. And that [an
accidental attribute such as the body] has been
determined not to be other [than awareness]. Thus
everything falls under the category of the subject. The
subject is really unitary. And He alone exists....
Therefore, beginning with "Bhagavan Sadasiva cognizes"
and ending with "The worm cognizes"--there is only one
subject. Consequently, all cognitions [by apparently
different subjects really] belong to that [one]
subject.[109]

The term vimarsa and its cognates have the significance of a
judgment with a recognitive structure.[110] The arguments
centering on these terms develop earlier considerations of
Bhartrhari on the linguisticality of experience. They refute
the Buddhist contention that recognition is just a contingent
reaction to direct experience, by claiming that it is
integral or transcendental to it. As Utpala explains:

They attest that recognitive judgment [vimarsa] is the
essential nature of awareness [avabhasa]. Otherwise,
awareness [prakasa], even though colored [upararakta] by
the object, would be like that which is insentient, such
as a crystal, and so on.[111]

Among the considerations the Saivas adduce for this thesis
are: that children must build upon a subtle form of
linguistic judgment in their learning of conventional
language; that there must be a recognitive ordering of our
most basic experiences of situations and movements in order
to account for our ability to perform rapid behaviors; and
that some kind of subtle application of language in all
experiences is necessary in order to account for our ability
to remember them.[112]

The Saivas further elaborate their position on the
transcendental nature of recognition against the Buddhists by
inverting the latters' point of view on the epistemic
statuses of universals and particulars. The Saivas make the
recognition of universals primary, and hold that particulars
are constructed at a secondary level through the synthesis of
these syntheses. As Abhinava puts it briefly in the course of
discussing another issue:

It has been explained here [in the Pratyabhijna] that
objects are nothing but manifestations. They are
sometimes mixed, through the unification of recognitive
judgment [paramarsa], when they have the form of the
particular. And sometimes they are recognitively judged
[paramrsyante] as unmixed, when they have the form of the
universal.[113]

In this explanation, the Saivas attempt to achieve a double
victory. The perceptions of both sorts of entities are
claimed to depend intimately on conceptualization, especially
that alleged by the Buddhists to be of the most basic and
discrete sense data.

Now, neither the arguments about prakasa nor those about
vimarsa and its cognates are meant to stand alone. The
idealistic prakasa arguments make the recognition shown by
the vimarsa arguments to be integral to all epistemic
processes, constitutive of them and their objects. The
following statement places vimarsa in the idealistic algebra:

Here, as the multiplicity of things are recognitively
apprehended [vimrsyate], so they exist [asti]. This is so
because Being [astitva] depends upon awareness [prakasa].
That is, there is the manifestation of Being as depending
on the recognitive judgment [vimarsa] regarding what is
brought about through this awareness [prakasa]....
Therefore, something exists as much and in whatever way
it is recognitively apprehended [vimrsyate] and
unsublated.[114]

Several points must now be spelled out. Since according to
the prakasa arguments all experience belongs to one subject,
this recognition must be His self-recognition. And, inasmuch
as this self-recognition is the means by which Siva causes
the emanation of the universe, it is none other than His
Sakti. This identity of self-recognition and Sakti is stated
very frequently:

The Sakti which is Creatorhood [kartrtva], which has the
nature of Lordship, contains all the Saktis. That [Sakti]
has the nature of recognitive judgment [vimarsa].
Therefore it is proper that only it is predominant.... As
He recognitively apprehends [paramrsati] His Self, so,
because everything is contained within Him, He appears as
[objects such as] blue, and so on.[115]

Sakti is, of course, also the reason term in the Saiva
inference. In the following passage, Utpala thus places the
two chief Saktis of Cognition and Action, interpreted in
terms of recognition, in the position of inferential reason:

He [the subject] is the Great Lord since it is
necessarily the case that he is recognitively judging
[vimarsattvena niyatena], and since that very
re-cognitive judgment [vimarsa] is the pure Cognition and
Action of God [deva].[116]

We are led to the startling realization that
self-recognition, the thesis-goal of the Saiva's
inferential-ritual methodology, is identical with the reason
that justifies it. That is, one is inferentially led to the
recognition that one is the Lord, because everything is one's
self-recognition.

This may be put another way. The Pratyabhijna treatments of
perceptual cognition along with other topics of epistemology
may be understood as a recovery or reintegration of the
Lord's self-recognition, which has been fragmented into the
recognitions constituting ordinary experience. The following
terse statement by Abhinavagupta elucidates as such both key
formulations of the inferential rationale and the sakta upaya
modus operandi, that is, the revealing of Sakti and the
operation of Pure Wisdom/Good Reasoning in purifying
conceptualization:

The ascertainment [adhyavasa] judges [paramsanti][117]
word and object, characterized by name and form, as one,
in the form "This is that." [That ascertainment] is the
Sakti of the Supreme Lord, who has the nature of
recognitive judgment [vimarsa]. It appears only "as the
Self," that is, nonseparately from "I." However, it never
appears as "this," that is, as separate [from the
Self].[118]

The recognition of an objective "This"/"This is that" is
really the emanatory self-recognition "I." This fact may be
expressed either as "'This' is Sakti" or with the expression
of Pure Wisdom "I am this."[119] The primordial status
accorded to self-recognition in the interpretation of Saiva
emanationism has defined the radical conclusion of it's
transcendental inquiry. It is the fact that the Pratyabhijna
theory of recognition so fully encodes the Saiva myth that
makes the inquiries that disclose it into tantric ritual that
bestows salvation.

Our discovery of the identity of the reason and conclusion of
the Pratyabhijna inference brings us back to the overarching
theological negations we considered at the beginning of the
discussion of methodology. I there explained the Saivas'
understanding of the Lord's ultimate nonobjectifiability in
terms of their conceptions of grace and self-luminosity.
Abhinava gives these ideas another important articulation in
his works on practical theology. Above his threefold scheme
of increasingly subtle and internal means, he postulates what
he calls the "nonmeans" (anupaya).This is a final stage of
immediate realization involving no effort or very slight
effort.

Some of Abhinava's remarks in his discussion of this nonmeans
are directly pertinent to our present consideration of the
steps of the Pratyabhijna inference. More fundamental than
but homologous to the identity of inferential reason and
conclusion is Abhinavagupta's denial here of the ultimate
validity of any relation between a distinct spiritual means
(upaya)and goal (upeya):

The relation of means [upaya] and goal [upeya] is an
illusion of grossness of cognition. It is the Action
Sakti which is the cause of both bondage and
liberation.[120]

What use is there with reasonings regarding the
self-luminous principle of consciousness [samvittattva]?.
.. All means [upaya], external and internal, depend upon
it. How could they be means [upaya] regarding it?...
[Objects of different kinds of experience, such as] blue,
yellow, and pleasure are only awareness [prakasa], that
is, Siva. Since there is [really only] this supreme
nonduality which has the nature of awareness [prakasa],
what relation of means [upaya] and goal [upeya] could
there be which is other than it? For that [relation of
means and goal] is only awareness [prakasa].[121]

It is the Lord's omnipotence and self-luminous unity that
preclude all relationships of distinct means and the goal.
This general conception of practical theology is exemplified
in the identity of reason and conclusion in the Pratyabhijna
inference.

From a philosophical point of view, the identity of reason
and conclusion in the Pratyabhijna inference may seem to
admit a vitiating circularity. Though this essay is not
strictly philosophical, even its exegetic project requires
that I say that I do not believe this is so. For, in the
Pratyabhijna, the soteriology is not presumed but is supposed
to be discovered in inquiries into common problems and
following common rules of Sanskrit philosophical discourse.
The Saivas' development of these inquiries required an
enormous amount of creative interpretation and hard
"methodologically detached" thinking. In effect, all these
inquiries that they have developed constitute "reasons for
the reason" that is emanation/self-recognition. From our
extratraditional perspective, the circularity of the
inference is thus transformed into a cognitively advancing
hermeneutic circularity.

It is only within the intratraditional perspective that the
elaborate argumentation of Pratyabhijna sastra does not do
anything. We must recur to the monistic mythical dynamics of
emanation and return. Utpaladeva describes the soteriological
reintegration of self-recognition through the Pratyabhijna
system as a sort of "telos" of the phenomena of ordinary
experience:

The accomplishment of the purpose [krtarthata] of the
separated recognitive judgment [virnarsa] "this"--is the
recognitive judgment [vimarsa] of rest [visranti] in its
own essential nature [expressed] "I am He."[122]

The progress of phenomena toward self-recognition is nothing
but a clarification of their nature as self-recognition.
Cosmogony and teleology are the same. Thus Abhinavagupta
compares the recognition constituting ordinary experience to
a point of rest in a paradoxical journey between the
identical origin and goal of Siva's self-recognition.

That which is called recognitive judgment [paramarsa] is
the absolutely final and true [paryantikam eva
paramarthikam] place of rest [visrantisthanam]; and it
only has the form "I." In traveling to a village, the
intermediate point of rest [madhyavisrantipadam], at the
root of a tree, is explained to be created as expectant
of that [final point of rest].... Thus also blue, and so
on, existing in the intermediate recognitive judgment
[paramarsa] as "This is blue," are established to cnsist
of the Self. For they rest upon the root recognitive
judgment [paramarsa] "I."[123]

The new Saiva philosophy, with all of its technical procedure
of justification, is a path of return in a circular journey
that never really departs.[124]

NOTES

This essay develops one of the themes in my "Argument and the Recognition
of Siva: The Philosophical Theology of Utpaladeva and Abhinavagupta" (Ph.D.
diss., University of Chicago, 1992). An earlier version of this essay was
presented in the session "Encoding and Overcoding in the Tantras" at the
22d Annual Conference on South Asia, Madison, 1993.

The following abbreviations are used in the text or the notes:

BIPV Bhaskari, by Bhaskarakantha, commentary on IPV.

IPK Isvarapratyabhijnakarika, by Utpaladeva.

IPKV Isvarapratyabhijnakarikavrtti, by Utpaladeva, commentary
on IPK.

IPV Isvarapratyabhijnavimarsini, by Abhinavagupta, commentary
on IPK.

IPVV Isvarapratyabhijnavivrtivimarsini, by Abhinavagupta,
commentary on Utpaladeva's Isvarapratyabhijnavivrtti.

SD Sivadrsti by Somananda.

TA Tantraloka, by Abhinavagupta.

TAV Tantralokaviveka, by Jayaratha, commentary on TA.

TS Tantrasara, by Abhinavagupta.

1. Wilhelm Halbfass, India and Europe: An Essay in
Understanding (Albany: State University of New York
Press, 1988), p. 157.

2. There was an effort to create a bridge between these
approaches at the University of Chicago Conferences on
Religions in Culture and History, 1986-1989, and the
resulting SUNY series, Toward a Comparative Philosophy of
Religion. For examples of several approaches, see
Francisa Cho Bantly, ed., Deconstructing/ Reconstructing
the Philosophy of Religion: Summary Reports from the
Conferences on Religions in Culture and History 1986-1989
(Chicago: University of Chicago Divinity School, 1990);
and see Frank E. Reynolds and David Tracy, eds., Myth and
Philosophy (Albany: State University of New York Press,
1990), Discourse and Practice (Albany State University of
New York Press, 1992), and Religion and Practical Reason:
New Essays in the Comparative Philosophy of Religion
(Albany State University of New York Press, 1994).

3. The relativist Howard Eilberg Schwartz thus attempts to
destroy the universality and normativity of philosophical
rationality precisely by reducing it to myth. See "Myth,
Inference and the Relativism of Reason: An Argument from
the History of Judaism," in Reynolds and Tracy, Myth and
Philosophy, pp. 247-285.

4. One of the greatest pioneers of comparative philosophy,
Bimal Krishna Matilal, did do some interpretation of
religion, particularly in his later years. However, most
of his work has the form described. Thus, see his most
important study, Perception: An Essay on Classical Indian
Theories of Knowledge (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1986).
One of the most outspoken advocates of the seriousness of
Indian philosophies, Daya Krishna, has claimed that their
expressed religious objectives are an excuse to
legitimate intellectual speculations.

5. See Pierre Hadot, Exercices spirituels etphilosophie
antique (Paris: Etudes Augustiniennes, 1981).

6. David Tracy is an heir to the tradition of Christian
philosophical theology who has made great efforts to
develop it to address contemporary problems of
interpretation and rationality. See his analysis of the
different types of philosophical and nonphilosophical
theological discourse in The Analogical Imagination:
Christian Theology and the Culture of Pluralism (New
York: Crossroad Publishing Co., 1975), pp. 47-98. I will
refer to this analysis in interpreting the Pratyabhijna
philosophy below. Also see David Tracy, "The Uneasy
Alliance Reconceived: Catholic Theological Method,
Modernity, and Post-Modernity," Theological Studies 50
(1989): 548-570.

7. Scholars making such efforts are as diverse as Bimal
Krishna Matilal, Michael Hayes, Paul Griffiths, Robert
Neville, and Tu Wei-ming.

8. The main textual focus of this essay will be
Utpaladeva's Isvarapratyabhijnakarika (IPK) and
Abhinavagupta's Isvarapratyabhijnavimarsini (IPV). For
these texts I will use the edition
Isvarapratyabhijnavimarsini of Abhinavagupta, Doctrine of
Divine Recognition: Sanskrit Text with Bhaskari, 2 vols.,
ed. K. A. Subramania Iyer and K. C. Pandey (reprint,
Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1986). I will sometimes refer
to the eighteenth-century commentary on the IPV,
Bhaskari, by Bhaskara (BIPV). Also within the essay's
scope are: Utpaladeva, Siddhitrayi and the
Isvarapratyabhijnakarikavrtti, ed. Madhusudan Kaul
Shastri, Kashmir Series of Texts and Studies, no. 34
(Srinagar: Kashmir Pratap Steam Press, 1921) , and
Abhinavagupta, Isvarapratyabhijnavivrtivirnarsini, 3
vols., ed. Madhusudan Kaul Shastri, Kashmir Series of
Texts and Studies (reprint, Delhi: Akay Book Corporation,
1987) . The Isvarapratyabhijnakarikavrtti and
Isvarapratyabhijnavivrtivimarsini will henceforth be
referred to as IPKV and IPVV, respectively.

This essay will for the most part treat the Pratyabhijna
theories of Utpaladeva and Abhinavagupta as an integral
whole. As is usual in foundational verse and aphorism
texts, Utpaladeva's IPK is densely written and is
intended to be expounded in subordinate commentaries.
However, there is presently available only the shorter of
Utpaladeva's commentaries, centered on the IPK the
IPKV--which is mostly concerned with clarifying the basic
meaning of the verses. Abhinavagupta's commentaries have
the quality of deep and original thought, but it is most
often impossible to distinguish arguments which had
direct precedent in Utpaladeva from those which either
further or depart from his discussions. It is also in
accordance with the intentions of the Indian genre of
text and commentary to treat them as presenting one
system.

9. I am working on a constructive philosophical
interpretation of the Pratyabhijna, system in
transforming my "Argument and the Recognition of Siva"
into a book, and in an article.

10. IPK 1.1, benedictory verse, 1: 18.

11. IPV 1.1, on IPK, benedictory verse, 1:17.

12. IPV 1.1, on IPK, benedictory verse, 1:28-29.

13. IPV 1.1, on IPK, benedictory verse, 1: 37-38.

14. There are numerous discussions of the soteriological
significance of the recognition which the Pratyabhijna
system aims to convey. See IPV 1.1, on IPK, benedictory
verse, 1:33-34, and on this BIPV, 33-34; IPV 1.1, on IPK,
benedictory verse, 1:38-39; IPV 1.1, on IPK, benedictory
verse, 1:41-42; IPK and IPV 3.2.11-12, 2:256259; IPK and
IPV 4.1.15, 2:308; IPK 4.1.18, 2:315-316; and also the
discussions of the practical causal efficacy (arthakriya)
of recognition at IPV 1.1.2, 1:58-59; IPK and IPV 4.1.17,
2:312-315.

15. IPV 1.1, on IPK, benedictory verse, 1:32.

16. IPV 1.1, on IPK, benedictory verse, 1:29-30; BIPV on
IPV 1.1, on IPK, benedictory verse, 1:30; IPV 4.1.18,
2:316.

17. On hermeneutic charity, see Paul Griffiths, An Apology
for Apologetics (Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books, 1991),
pp. 20-21.

18. IPV 1.1, introductory verse, 3, 1: 8.

19. IPV 4.1.16, 2:309.

20. See IPVV, 1.1, 1: 16. Cf. IPV and BIPV 1.1.4, 1:78; and
Utpaladeva in The Sivadrsti of Srisomanandanatha with the
Vritti by Utpaladeva, ed. Madhusudan Kaul Shastri,
Kashmir Series of Texts and Studies, no. 54 (Pune:
Aryabhushan Press, 1934), 3.16, 105. Somananda's text
will henceforth be abbreviated as SD.

21. In this way, the Pratyabhijna illustrates what Alexis
Sanderson has called the "overcoding" by which the
various Kashmiri Saiva traditions have appropriated the
symbolism and praxis of other traditions. Brian Smith has
interpreted this pattern of appropriation in the Vedic
and larger South Asian contexts as "encompassment" on the
basis of a presumed "hierarchical resemblance." See Brian
K. Smith, Reflections on Resemblance, Ritual and Religion
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989), pp. 46-49,
186-189. I believe that the pattern is actually a
reflection of the hermeneutic circle, necessary to all
acts of interpretation.

22. Mircea Eliade conceptualized this issue in terms of
history and the transcendence of history, as the
"dialectic of the Sacred."

23. In Saivism generally, He is said to perform five cosmic
acts: the creation of the universe, the preservation of
it, the destruction of it, the creation of human delusion
(which is the cause of suffering in rebirth), and the
bestowal of salvific grace.

24. See the discussion of sections from the Tantraloka,
Tantrasara, and Malinivijayavarttika, in Debabrata Sen
Sharma, The Philosophy of Sadhana: With Special Reference
to Trika Philosophy of Kasmira (Karnal, Haryana: Natraj
Publishing House, 1983), pp. 88 ff.

25. IPV 1.1, on IPK, benedictory verse, 1: 24-28. Cf.
Sivadrsti 1.1, 2.

26. The Advaita Vedantin theory itself interprets
discussions in the Upanisads, and was also influenced by
the Mimamsaka doctrine of the 'self-establishedness'
(svatahpramanya) of the means of cognition (pramanas), as
well as the Buddhist logicians' notion of the 'validating
self-awareness' (svasamvedana) inherent in all
experiences.

27. The two chief sections where Utpaladeva and
Abhinavagupta focus on the issue of self-luminosity are
IPK and IPV 1.1.1, 1:4756, and 2.3.15-16, 2:134-139.
(Abhinavagupta points out the connection between these
discussions, in IPV 2.3.15-16, 134.) Cf. IPV 1.1, on IPK,
benedictory verse, 1:38. On ignorance/illusion in the
context of self-luminosity, also see IPK and IPV 1.1.2,
1: 5759; IPKand IPV 2.3.17, 2:141-143.

28. IPV 2.3.17, 2: 143-144.

29. Tracy, Analogical Imagination, p. 57. See the analysis of
the differences between fundamental, systematic, and
practical theologies in terms of five rubrics, ibid., pp.
54-58. Also see the discussion focusing on fundamental
theology, in ibid., pp. 62-64. Tracy acknowledges that,
because it is produced in particular historical
situations, the effort of fundamental theology is
intrinsically "problematic, "uncertain," and only "partly
history-transcending." See his Blessed Rage for Order:
The New Pluralism in Theology (Minneapolis:
Winston-Seabury Press, 1975), pp. 6487, and his "Uneasy
Alliance Reconceived," pp. 557-559, 567568. Cf. Paul J.
Griffiths' description of philosophy in its ideal-typical
character of transcending the limitations of historical
context, as "denaturalized discourse," in "Denaturalizing
Discourse: Abhidharmikas, Propositionalists, and the
Comparative Philosophy of Religion, " in Tracy and
Reynolds, Myth and Philosophy, p. 66.

30. I emphasize that not all sastraic discourse is
philosophical in the sense that I have given the term
here. According to this criterion, even the well-known
Advaita Vedantin thinker Sankara, for whom reason is
subordinated to the process of exegesis of scripture, is
a philosopher only on exceptional occasions. He would
more accurately be described as a systematic and
practical theologian or "Brahmalogian."

31. The list is given at Nyayadarsanam: With Vatsyayana's
Bhasya, Uddyotakara's Varttika, Vacaspati Misra's
Tatparyatika and Visvanatha's Vrtti, ed. Taranatha
Nyaya-Tarkatirtha and Amarendramohan Tarkatirtha, with
introd. by Narendra Chandra Vedantatirtha (Delhi:
Munshiram Manoharlal, 1985), p. 28. The paradigmatic role
of the Nyaya standards is demonstrated in the studies of
Matilal. See particularly "The Nature of Philosophical
Argument," chap. in Matilal, Perception, pp. 69-93.

32. IPV 1.1, on IPK, benedictory verse, 1:43. Abhinava
states here that he is explaining the view of Utpaladeva.
I note that we must rely on explanations of Abhinavagupta
in considering the relation of the Pratyabhijna method to
the Nyaya standards of philosophical argument. Utpaladeva
does not seem directly to treat this issue in his
available writings. Certainly the classic philosophical
standards are in many ways implied in his speculation,
and Abhinava's formulations are profoundly elucidative of
Utpala's thought. We may nevertheless see in Abhinava's
discussions of the Nyaya method some of his genuine
innovations.

The stress here on the Saivas' use of Nyaya concerns
their construction of their philosophical methodology in
the pursuit of universal intelligibility. I am not
claiming that the Saivas are more substantively
"influenced" by Nyaya than other schools of Indian
philosophy such as Vyakarana, Buddhist logic, Samkhya,
Advaita, etc.

33. IPV 2.3.17, 2:140.

34. For a good explanation of the Nyaya categories, see
Matilal, Perception, pp. 71-93.

35. According to Nyaya, it is the knowledge of the
following prameyas which leads to liberation: atma, siro,
indriya, buddhi, manas, pravrtti, dosa, pretyabhava,
phala, duhkha, and apavarga (Nyayadarsanam 1.1.9, 180).

36. IPV 2.3.17, 2:140.

37. IPV. Cf. IPVV 2.3.17, 3:181-182.

38. There were debates between the Indian schools about the
precise number of steps and the structure of the
inference for the sake of others. Abhinava dismisses the
Buddhist disputation of the number of parts as mere
obstinacy (IPV 2.3.17, 2: 140).

39. This account largely follows the interpretations by
Karl H. Potter, ed., Encyclopedia of Indian Philosophies,
vol. 2, Indian Metaphysics and Epistemology: The
Tradition of Nyaya-Vaisesika up to Gangesa (Delhi:
Motilal Banarsidass, 1977) , pp. 180-181, and
Presuppositions of India's Philosophies (Englewood
Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1963), pp. 60-61, and
by Matilal, Perception, p. 78.

40. IPV 2.3.17, 2:142-143.

41. IPK 1.1.2, 1: 57. The same idea is expressed at IPK
2.3.1 7, 2: 141. Utpaladeva never explicitly mentions the
inference for the sake of others in his available
writings. However, his statements fit precisely into
Abhinava's explanation of the inference. See above, note
32.

42. Abhinava explains elsewhere that by the word "Saktis"
there are indicated the qualities (dharma) of the Lord
(IPVV 2.3.1 7, 3: 182; IPV 2.3.17, 2:146). At IPVV
1.5.21, 2: 269, Abhinava explains that in different
contexts the same fact may be variously referred to by
the terms quality (dharma), Sakti, attribute (guna) and
operation (vyapara).

43. On the latter correspondence, see note 124. The Saktis
of Cognition and Action are also central categories of
prephilosophical tantras.

44. Thus there are the Memory (smrti) Sakti, Semantic
Exclusion (apohana) Sakti, Time (kala) Sakti, and
Causal-Regularity (niyati) Sakti.

45. IPK 1.1.3, 61.

46. See IPV 1.1.3, 1: 62-67; IPV 1.1.4, 1: 76-77; IPV
1.6.11, 1: 141 143.

47. Pure Wisdom is discussed at IPK and IPV 3.1.3-7,
2:221-232.

48. IPK 3.1.4, 2: 225. This translation is influenced by
that of Pandey, Doctrine of Divine Recognition, 3:193.

49. On the operation of Pure Wisdom in bringing about the
soteriological recognition, see IPV 3.1.7, 2:230-231; and
IPK and IPV 3.2.2-3, 2: 246-247.

50. IPV 1.1.3, 1: 67-68.

51. IPV2.3.17, 2:144-145.

52. IPV 2.3.17, 2: 145-146.

53. Other expressions of the inference assert that the
individual is full (purna) of the universe, like a
treasure is of jewels; and pervades the prior and latter
parts of the universe, like the earth in relation to
sprouts. See the series of expressions at IPV 2.3.17, 2:
144-146, and IPVV, 2.3.17, 3:181-182.

54. I note that Abhinava goes so far in what might be
called his enthusiasm for philosophical rationalization
as to indicate correspondences of inferential steps with
parts of the Pratyabhijna text. He asserts that
Utpaladeva's introductory verse states the thesis, and
that one of his concluding verses, IPK 4.1.16, 2: 309,
states the conclusion. The middle of the book expresses
the "reason (hetu), and so on," i.e., steps 2 through 4
(IPV 1.1, on IPK, benedictory verse, 1:42-43). The
Pratyabhijna thesis may only be understood implicitly
within the introductory and concluding verses, which do
not at all have the style of an inferential thesis and
conclusion. Though the correspondences with particular
sections must thus not be taken too strictly, the
characterization is illuminating. The middle of the text,
which is supposed to contain the reason, general
principle, and application, is largely constituted by the
technical discussions of problems of epistemology and
ontology important to the Indian philosophical academy.
These discussions logically substantiate the
soteriological purpose of the system articulated in the
thesis.

55. Alexis Sanderson suggested in a personal conversation
in 1991 that this practice reflects the assimilation of
Saktism within Saivism.

56. Abhinavagupta's pupil Ksemaraja gives interesting
interpretations of the revealing of Sakti in his
commentaries on the Sivasutras and Spandakarikas. He
explains the Krama mastery of circles of Saktis as the
background to practices in these texts. See Sivasutras:
The Yoga of Supreme Identity: Text of the Sutras and the
Commentary Vimarsini of Ksemaraja, ed. and trans. Jaideva
Singh (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1979), 3.30, 196-197,
and The Spandakarikas of Vasugupta with the Nirnaya by
Ksemaraja, ed. and trans. Madhusudan Kaul Shastri,
Kashmir Series of Texts and Studies, no. 42 (Srinagar:
Kashmir Pratap Steam Press, 1925), 1.1, 3-8; 3.19, 74;
1.5, 19. Sanderson accepts Ksemaraja's view about the
Krama background as probable; see Alexis Sanderson,
"Saivism and the Tantric Traditions," in The World's
Religions, ed. Stewart Sutherland et al. (London:
Routledge, 1988), pp. 694-695. Cf. Bhaskara's explanation
of the process of becoming the Lord of the circle in BIPV
1.8, 1: 399-400. The last passage was pointed out by
Navjivan Rastogi, "The Philosophy of Krama Monism of
Kashmir: An Analytical Study" (Ph.D. thesis, Lucknow
University, 1967), pp. 417-418. This work also contains
information on the relation of Krama to spanda.

57. The Vijnana-Bhairava with Commentary by Kshemaraja and
Partly by Shivopadhyaya, ed. Mukunda Rama Shastri,
Kashmir Series of Texts and Studies, no. 8 (Bombay:
Tatvavivechaka Press, 1918) , 18-21, 13-15. This
translation is influenced by that of Vijnana-bhairava or
Divine Consciousness: A Treasury of 112 Types of Yoga,
ed. and trans. Jaideva Singh (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass,
1979), 18-21, 16-17. The passage is cited by Jayaratha in
The Tantraloka of Abhinavagupta with the Commentary of
Jayaratha, 8 vols., ed. Madhusudan Kaul Shastri and
Mukunda Rama Shastri, Kashmir Series of Texts and
Studies, ed. R. C. Dwivedi and Navjivan Rastogi (reprint,
Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1987) , 1.74, 2: 115.
Abhinavagupta's work will henceforth be referred to as
TA, and Jayaratha's commentary, Tantralokaviveka, will be
referred to as TAV.

58. For this word, bhangyah, I follow Singh,
Vijnanabhairava, p. 99.

59. Shastri, The Vijnana-Bhairava with Commentary Partly by
K.she-marcia and Partly by Shivopadhyaya, 109-110, 95-96.

60. This expression contains exactly the fourth,
application, step of the inference, i.e, "I, who have the
qualities [dharma] of Siva, am none but He."

61. Ibid.

62. The features of the sakta upaya treated below are
discussed throughout TA 4, 1: 61 7-923, and in The
Tantrasara of Abhinavagupta, ed. Mukunda Ram Sastri,
Kashmir Series of Texts and Studies, no. 17 (reprint,
Delhi: Bani Prakashan, 1982), 4, 21-34. I can make only a
few comments here about Abhinava's classification of
means of realization. The first three means-types are
distinguished by operation on the levels of the Trika
cosmological triads. In ascending order, these are the
individual means (anava upaya), the means of Sakti (sakta
upaya), and the means of Sambhu, a.k.a. Siva (sambhava
upaya). Above them, Abhinava posits the 'non-means'
(anupaya), which designates the direct absorption into
Ultimate Reality involving little or no effort.

Some contemporary scholars have assumed that the
Pratyabhijna system teaches the 'nonmeans' (anupaya).
See, e.g., R. K. Kaw, The Doctrine of Recognition
(Pratyabhijna Philosophy), Vishveshvaranand Indological
Series, no. 40 (Hoshiarpur: Vishveshvaranand Institute,
1967), p. 264, and Mark Dyczkowski, The Doctrine of
Vibration: An Analysis of the Doctrines and Practices of
Kashmir Shaivism, ed. Harvey Alper, SUNY Series in the
Shaiva Traditions of Kashmir (Albany: State University of
New York Press, 1987), p. 1 79. Dyczkowski apparently
bases his classification on Abhinavagupta's citations of
the authority of Somananda on the nonmeans, and on the
lack of need for practice after Siva is realized.
However, none of the relevant statements by Somananda or
Abhinavagupta state that the Pratyabhijna system works
through the nonmeans. See SD 75b-6, 209; TA and TAV 2.48,
2: 349-350; IPV 1.1, on IPK, benedictory verse, 1:31-32;
IPV 4.1.16, 2:311. In my opinion, the significance of the
nonmeans is closely related to that of the doctrines of
self-luminosity and divine omnipotence. The highest
realization is that Siva is already realized, and this
highest realization itself is known to be brought about
by Siva. I further develop this point at the end of the
essay.

The sakta upaya classification was first suggested to me
by Pt. Hemendra Nath Chakravarty. This well supported my
own analysis of practical themes that seemed to
contradict the nommeans classification. Pt. Chakravarty
and I then spent a considerable amount of time
researching the sakta upaya classification of the system
together. Dr. Navjivan Rastogi later informed me that he
also made the sakta upaya classification. He provided me
with a copy of the unpublished second volume of his
dissertation, "The Philosophy of Krama Monism of Kashmir:
An Analytical Study," which elucidates many connections
between the Pratyabhijna and the sakta upaya. My
understanding of the Pratyabhijna system in terms of the
sakta upaya is therefore indebted to Pt. Chakravarty and
Dr. Rastogi--though I have also researched it on my own.
Alexis Sanderson also later supported the sakta upaya
interpretation in our personal conversation. A summary of
my understanding of this issue is found in my "Argument
and the Recognition of Siva," pp. 85-98. The chief points
on this topic made in this essay are my own: the way the
revealing of Sakti and Pure Wisdom in the Pratyabhijna
system as well as the sakta upaya articulate the same
knowledge of emanation, their function within an
inference in the Pratyabhijna system, and the connections
between this inference and the sakta upaya.

63. See his commentary on Vijnana-Bhairava, 109-110, 95-96.
I may have learned of this statement from Dr. Rastogi.

64. In personal conversation, Sanderson did not wish to
make a special connection of the sakta upaya with the
practice of the revealing of Sakti because this practice
is so general. Both the revealing of Sakti and the
operation of Pure Wisdom actually figure in Abhinava's
other classifications. However, they are given thematic
prominence in the sakta upaya.

65. Rastogi, "Philosophy of Krama," p. 388.

66. See TA 4, 3: 617-923 and TS 4, 21-33.

67. TA 1.217-218, 2:240.

68. Alexis Sanderson explained in personal conversation
that an increasing valuation of knowledge is evident even
in the composition of the Saiva scriptures.

69. TA and TAV 1.148, 2: 186-187. On this section of the
text, see Rastogi, "Philosophy of Krama," p. 416. The
fact that the sakta upaya is the means of knowledge can
be understood on the basis of its operation on the middle
level of the Trika cosmic triad, which is in one version
the Cognition/Knowledge (jnana) Sakti. See Alexis
Sanderson, "Mandala and Agamic Identity in the Trika of
Kashmir," in Mantras et diagramroes rituels dans L
'Hindouisme, ed. Andre Padoux (Paris: Centre National de
la Recherche Scientifique, 1986), p. 173 n. 9.

70. See TA and TAV4.13, 3:628-629.

71. Sri Malinfvijayottara Tantram, ed. Madhusudan Kaul
Shastri (Delhi: Butala and Company, 1984), 17.18-19, 114.
These verses are quoted at TA 4.15-16, 3:630-631. The
role of reasoning along with scholarly works (sastras) in
bringing about the discrimination between heya and
upadeya is discussed in Nyayadarsanam 1.1, 1.

72. TA 4.118-119, 3: 737. Cf. TA 4.218-220, 3: 858-859. In
his definitions of purity and impurity, Abhinava is
subverting orthodox Hindu understanding of the objective
reality of these qualities. For his criticism of orthodox
ideas, again citing the authority of the Malinfvijaya
Tantra, also see TS 4.43, 31.

I should also observe here that, aside from the operation
of the inference, Abhinava frames an elaborate discussion
in the Pratyabhijna Agamadhikara of the sorts of subjects
existing on different cosmological levels in terms of the
categories of that which is to be avoided and that which
is to be pursued. He even explains the soteriological
recognition itself in terms of making the discrimination
between these two (IPV 3.2, Introduction, 2: 244) .
Utpaladeva himself refers to certain states of
consciousness as to be abandoned (heya) at IPK 3.2.18,
2:269. The difference between the two classes is again
that of the absorption or non-absorption of the object
into the emanatory subject (IPV 3.2.2-3, 2: 246-247).

73. Pure Wisdom is fifth from the top in the
thirty-sixfold scheme of tattvas, and intermediate in the
Trika cosmic triads. In personal conversation, Alexis
Sanderson suggested that Abhinavagupta may have utilized
this principle in explaining the sakta upaya because of
its importance in the Pratyabhijna.

74. TA 4.34, 3: 655. Likewise see TS 4, 23-26.
Abhinavagupta frequently utilizes the terms
interchangeably; see TA 4.44b-45a, 3: 665; TA 4.109-118,
3: 729-737. The identification exemplifies
Abhinavagupta's general view that spiritual means (upaya)
are identical with their goal (upeya). This view will be
discussed further at the end of this essay.

75. TA 4.111-114, 3: 731-733.

76. To emphasize further the encompassment of the
Pratyabhijna inference by the soteriology, I mention one
other point: Pure Wisdom in the Pratyabhijna itself is
also referred to as the Wisdom (vidya) Sakti to highlight
its character as an activity of the Lord. Abhinava
explains: "When there is born the condition of the bound
creature... then the Sakti of the Supreme Lord
illuminates His Lordship, as has been explained by means
of the previously stated arguments. She due to whom some,
having accepted these arguments and having their hearts
encouraged, become successful--is the Wisdom Power" (IPV
3.1.7, 2:230-231). Also see IPK 3.2.2, 2: 246, and IPV
3.2.2-3, 2: 246-247.

77. See Matilal, Perception, pp. 53, 74, 80. Decision
(nirnaya) is another Nyaya category.

78. IPV 1.2, Introduction, 1: 82. Cf. IPV 4.1.1 6,
2:309-310. I observe that many nonphilosophical sastras
are also structured around debates with opponents. For
example, there may be doubt or debate about
interpretations of texts, doctrines, or practices which
are assumed to be correct. This sort of discussion is
common to nonphilosophical academic (and, of course,
nonacademic) discussion around the world. There are
certainly gray areas between what should and should not
be considered philosophical. The distinction perhaps
depends upon the systematicity and depth of reflexivity.

79. IPV 1.2, benedictory verse, 1: 81.

80. IPV 1.2, Introduction, 1: 82. The verse is in The
Stava-Chintamani of Bhatta Narayana with Commentary by
Kshemaraja, ed. Mukunda Ram Shastri, Kashmir Series of
Texts and Studies, no. 10 (Srinagar: Kashmir Pratap Steam
Press, 1918), 71, 80.

81. TA 4.17, 3: 632. Abhinava identifies doubt with the
propensity to seeing duality, particularly of subject and
object, which is eliminated by good reasoning (sattarka);
see TA 4.105, 3:726. The significance of doubt in tantric
practice is discussed in Rastogi, "Philosophy of Krama,"
pp. 593-594.

82. TA 4.18-32, 3: 636-653; TS 4, 31-32.

83. TS 4.4-5, 21-22. Cf. Jayaratha's discussion of the
difference between the good reasoning of the Saivas and
the non-good reasoning (asattarka) of others at TAV4.1 7,
3: 636.

84. TA 4.39-40, 3: 659-660.

85. IPV, Conclusion, 2, 2:317.

86. See note 124 for remarks on the Saivas' development of
"tantric argument" in the realm of ontology.

87. Though Abhinavagupta mentions various other Buddhist
thinkers, the Saivas' understanding centers most on the
thought of Dharmakirti. Buddhist logic is sometimes
described as a hybrid of Yogacara and Sautrantika. I note
that there are not presently known any texts expressing
criticisms of the Saivas by this school. Whether or not
there were previous confrontations, what is important is
that the Buddhist logicians were seen as a great
intellectual threat by the large community of Hindu
philosophers. By answering the challenges posed by them,
the Saivas understood themselves as giving their
soteriology a strong intellectual foundation.

88. See the Saivas' summary of the basic views of Buddhist
logic at IPK and IPV 1.2.1 -2, 1: 85-91.

89. See Abhinavagupta's explanation of the "This is that"
structure of interpretation at IPVV 1.2.1 -2, 1: 115. He
supports this by quoting Vakyapadiya of Bhartrhari, kanda
2, ed. K. A. Subramania Iyer (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass,
1983), 2.128. I note that the Saiva theory of recognition
is actually elaborated with three sets of terms, all of
which have extensive backgrounds in the earlier
linguistic and epistemological speculations: (1)
Pratyabhijna, along with cognates such as abhijna, is
usually unproblematically translated just as
'recognition'. (2) Derivatives from the root mrs, such as
vimarsa, paramarsa, pratyavamarsa, amarsa, etc., convey
notions of linguistic interpretation, judgment,
apprehension, etc., which have a recognitive structure. I
accordingly often translate these terms as 'recognitive
judgment'.(3) Terms derived from attaching various
initial prefixes to the second prefix sam and the root
dha--e.g., anusamdhana, pratisamdhana, and
abhisamdhi--develop the significance of recognition
through notions of synthesis or association. I often
translate them as 'recognitive synthesis.' Previous
scholars have not understood the way the latter two
classes of terms articulate the Saiva theory of
recognition. In the Pratyabhina texts, these three
classes of terms are variously defined by one another,
used interchangeably, and placed in close functional
relationships. They are also employed disjunctively. The
presentation in this essay is made on the basis of the
synonymies and homologies between the classes of terms.
Textual support for my interpretation is found in my
"Argument and the Recognition of Siva," pp. 131-133.

90. See Nyayadarsanam, especially the Tatparyatika, 1.1.4,
93-131. Useful discussion of the debates about
interpretation vis-a-vis recognition may be found in
Dharmendra Nath Shastri, The Philosophy of
Nyaya-Vaisesika and Its Conflict with the Buddhist
Dignaga School (Critique of Indian Realism), with a
foreword by Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (Agra: Agra
University, 1964; reprint, Delhi: Bharatiya Vidya
Prakashan, 1976), pp. 144, 201-209, 227-230, 456471. I
note that in many discussions recognition and memory were
invoked by Hindu thinkers as proofs of a persisting Self
functioning as substratum for the impressions of the
past. Though they are sometimes used to defend
epistemological points, these are in themselves arguments
of philosophical psychology.

91. This is evident particularly in the fourth,
application, step of the inference for the sake of
others. See the discussions of lingaparamarsa by
Uddyotakara, Nyaya Varttika in Nyayadarsanam, 1.1.5,
142-143, and by Mahamahopadhyaya Bhimacarya Jhalakikar,
Nyayakosa, or Dictionary of Technical Terms of Indian
Philosophy, revised and re-edited by Mahamahopadhyaya
Vasudev Shastri Abhyankar (Poona: Bhandarkar Oriental
Research Institute, 1978) , pp. 709-710, and see
Abhinavagupta and Daniel Ingalls' explanation in The
"Dhvanyaloka" of Anandavardhana with the "Locana" of
Abhinavagupta, trans. Daniel H. H. Ingalls, Jeffrey
Moussaieff Masson, and M. V. Patwardhan (Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 1990), 3.33b, 546, 547-548 n.
7, and the remarks in Daniel Ingalls, Materials for the
Study of Navya-Nyaya Logic, ed. Walter Eugene Clark,
Harvard Oriental Series, no. 40 (Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 1951), 32-33. The converse view, that
all conceptual construction is inferential, is well
known; see Matilal, "Perception as Inference, " in
Perception, pp. 255-291.

92. IPV 1.1, on IPK, benedictory verse, 1:37-38.

93. This fact strongly suggests that Utpaladeva himself,
like Abhinavagupta, framed the operation of the sastra as
the inference for the sake of others.

94. The challenge of the Buddhists is presented in IPK and
IPV 1.2, 1:82-119.

95. The Navya-Nyaya later developed an approach to
epistemology that in some ways parallels the
Pratyabhijfina use of the ideas of Bhartrhari against the
Buddhists; see Matilal, "Conception-free Awareness:
Gangesa," in Perception, pp. 342-354. The Navya-Nyaya is,
however, a realistic system whereas the Pratyabhijna is a
kind of monistic idealism.

96. The Saivas use the latter designation. Contemporary
scholars are not agreed on whether this term reflects a
proper interpretation of Bhartrhari.

97. For Bhartrhari, the Word Absolute grounds linguistic
reference as accessed through semantic intuition
(pratibha) or manifestation (sphota).

98. This is not to deny that Bhartrhari's analysis of the
role of language in experience also had a great influence
on the Buddhists.

99. Somananda had already identified Supreme Speech with
Siva's creative Sakti. See SD 2, 36-93. For the
identification of self-recognition with Supreme Speech,
see IPV 1.5.13, 1:252-255; I PK 1.6.1, 1:302; and IPKV
1.6.1, 22. Utpaladeva lists Supreme Speech along with
recognition (pratyavamarsa) and Lordship as descriptions
of consciousness at IPK 1.5.13, 1:250. Utpaladeva also
identifies the Lord Himself as semantic intuition
(pratibha) (IPK 1.7.1, 1: 341).

100.IPV 1.5.15, 1: 267-268.

101.In explaining this cosmogony of self-recognition, the
Saivas correlate the Trika cosmological triad's levels of
emanation with Bhartrhari's states of the emanation of
speech. For a good discussion by Abhinavagupta, see IPV
1.5.13, 1:252-255. Cf. IPV 1.8.11, 1: 423-424; IPK and
IPV 4.1.13-14, 2: 305-307. On the unfragmented character
of the highest level of the Lord's
self-recognition/speech, see IPK and IPV 1.6.1, 1:
301-305. On the lowest level of fragmented
self-recognition, see IPK 1.6.6, 1: 324; IPKV 1.6.6, 24;
IPV 1.6.6, 1:324-327. The entirety of IPK and IPV 1.6,
1:299-344, is about differentiation inherent in ordinary
conceptual constructions. Abhinava describes the lowest
instances of recognition as reflected recognition
(chayamayi pratyabhijna) (IPVV 1.6.6, 2:314). He also
describes them as impure (asuddha) (IPV 1.6.6, 1:324-327;
IPVV 1.6.6, 2:314).

102.Cf. David Tracy on the nature of fundamental theology
as a transcendental/metaphysical inquiry, in Tracy,
Blessed Rage, pp. 5556, 108, and his "Uneasy Alliance
Reconceived," p. 559.

103.The Saivas believe that the Lord differentiates His
self-recognition into the different types of experience
such as cognition, memory, decision, and doubt through
His Maya Sakti (IPK and IPV 1.5.18, 1:280-283; IPK and
IPV 1.5.21, 1:296-298). Also see Bhaskara on IPV 1.6.10,
1:340, on the subtle judgment (pratyavamarsa) in all
forms of experience.

104.This is true of the studies of these terms by Harvey
Paul Alper, "Abhinavagupta's Concept of Cognitive Power:
A Translation of the Jnanasaktyahnika of the
Isvarapratyabhijnavimarsini with Commentary and
Introduction" (Ph.D. diss., University of Pennsylvania,
1976), "Siva and the Ubiquity of Consciousness: The
Spaciousness of an Artful Yogi," Journal of Indian
Philosophy 7 (1979): 345-407, and "'Svabhavam Avabhasasya
Vimarsam': Judgment as a Transcendental Category in
Utpaladeva's Saiva Theology: The Evidence of the
Pratyabhijnakarikavrtti" (unpublished).

105.It will be noticed that prakasa is the same word as
svaprakasa, 'self-luminosity, ' without the reflexive
prefix sva. The significance of prakasa as a validating
awareness is also understood against the background of
the Upanisadic, Advaita Vedantin, Mimamsaka, and Buddhist
logician conceptions mentioned in note 26 above.

106.These arguments develop in a monistic direction earlier
arguments of Vijnanavada Buddhism. However, the Saivas
conspicuously avoid the Vijnanavada arguments trying to
raise doubts about the validity of ordinary experience on
the basis of the occurrence of perceptual illusions.

107.IPK 1.5.2, 1:198. Also see IPV 1.5.2, 1:197-203; IPVV
1.5.2, 2:68.

108.See IPK and IPV 1.5.4, 1:210-212; IPK and IPV 1.5.6,
1:221225; IPK and IPV 1.5.8-9, 1:230-235. The Saivas here
are refuting the "representationalism" of the
Sautrantikas.

109.IPV 1.1.4, 1:76-77. Cf. IPV 1.1.3, 1:66-67; TS 1, 5-6.

110.See note 89 above.

111.IPK 1.5.11, 1:241.

112.For these arguments, see IPK and IPV 1.5.11, 1:241-243;
IPK 1.5.13, 1:250; IPV 1.5.14, 1:255-265; IPV 1.5.15,
1:267-268; IPV 1.5.19, 1: 283-293.

113.IPV 4.1.7, 2: 292-293. There is discussion pertaining
to the syntheses of universals and particulars throughout
IPK and IPV 2.3.114, 2:67-134. On this also see IPV
1.5.19, 1:293; IPK and IPV 1.8.5-9, 1:408-421; IPV 3.1,
Introduction, 2:214.

The Saiva treatment of universals and particulars is
again much indebted to Bhartrhari. On Bhartrhari's views,
see Radhika Herzberger, "Bhartrhari on Individuals and
Universals," in Bhartrhari and the Buddhists: An Essay in
the Development of Fifth and Sixth Century Indian
Thought, ed. Bimal K. Matilal and J. Moussaieff Masson,
Studies in Classical India (Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1986),
pp. 9-105.

114.IPV 1.1.3, 1:61-62. For statements of the identity of
awareness and recognition (vimarsa) also see IPK and IPV
1.5.11, 1:241244; and IPV 1.5.17, 1:273.

115.IPV 1.5.15, 1:267-268. In this passage I include an
earlier statement along with a sentence already quoted.
Another example will be quoted shortly. I also mention
that Abhinava identifies pratyavamarsa with synonyms for
Sakti, creative freedom (svatantrya) , and Lordship
(aisvarya) at IPV 1.5.13, 1:254. Recognitive synthesis
(anusamdhana) is identified with Sakti(s) at IPKV 1.3.7,
10, and with the Supreme Lord's creatorhood at IPV 1.6,
Introduction, 1: 301.

116.IPK 1.8.11, 1:1:421. See also IPV 1.8.11, 1: 423-424.

117.Bhaskara explains this word: "'Judges' [paramrsanti]
[means] brings to the condition of object of judgment
[paramarsavisayatam] by means of recognition
[pratyabhijna], which has the nature of the unification
of word and object [sabdarthaikikaranarupa]" (BIPV
1.5.20, 1:294).

118.IPV 1.5.20, 1:294-295. Also see IPK 1.5.20, 1:294.

119.For further elucidation of how the argument of the
Pratyabhijna relates to the sakta upaya theme of the
purification of conceptualization, see Abhinavagupta's
discussion of the spiritual ascent through ordinary
conceptual constructions through the flashing forth in
them of the Wisdom Power (vidysakti, a.k.a. suddhavidya,
Pure Wisdom) at IPV 1.6.6, 1:325-327. Cf. IPV 2.3.13,
2:129; TS 4, 27; and IPK and IPV 4.1.13-14, 2:305307.

120.TA 1.145, 2:184.

121.TA 2.10-11, 16-17, 2:319-323. The reader will recall
that in his sakta upaya, Abhinavagupta identifies the
tool, good reasoning, with the goal, Pure Wisdom.

122.Ajadapramatrsiddhi, in Siddhitrayi and the
Isvarapratyabhijnakarikavrtti, 15, 6. This is perhaps the
most frequently cited verse throughout Abhinava's
commentaries. Examples are found at IPV 1.1, on IPK,
benedictory verse, 1:35; IPV 1.5.11, 1:1:244; IPV 1.5.17,
1:279; IPVV 1.1, 1:54.

123.IPV 1.5.17, 1:278-279.

124.As I have mentioned, the Saivas develop an ontology
corresponding to the epistemology of recognition. I can
only make a few remarks on this subject here. The Saiva
ontology relies upon the Vyakarana interpretation of
Being/Existence (satta) as mythicoritual action (kriya),
and makes extensive use of grammatical discussions of
verbal-action syntax (karaka theory). Utpaladeva and
Abhinavagupta particularly engage earlier linguistic
considerations which either emphasize or de-emphasize the
role of the agent in relation to verbal action. The
Saivas develop the former to reduce action along with its
accessories, such as objects, instruments, etc., to the
omnipotent agency of Siva. Siva's agency is the
ontological counterpart to His self-recognition. As
Utpaladeva says: "Being is the condition of one who
becomes, that is, the agency of the act of becoming"
(satta bhavatta bhavanakartrta...) (IPKV 1.5.14, 19).
With this theory, the Pratyabhijna reenacts as it
interprets the very syntax of the Saiva mythico-ritual
drama. The Saiva treatment of action is found throughout
the Kriyadhikara of the Pratyabhijna texts (IPK and IPV
2.1-4, 2: 1-209). This subject is discussed in my
"Argument and the Recognition of Siva," pp. 192-229, and
in an article I am writing, "The Mythico-Ritual Syntax of
Omnipotence."