Insight Editions · No. 347
Spanda-Karikas
The Divine Creative Pulsation
Vasugupta · Kshemaraja · translated by Jaideva Singh
The Spanda-Karikas of Vasugupta with Kshemaraja's Spandanirnaya, in Jaideva Singh's translation: consciousness as creative pulsation, the opening and shutting of Siva's eyes, the junctions between states, unmesa, the circles of powers and bondage through words. Every verse of all four sections, the introduction, a glossary and a graded practice path, with critical notes.
A study guide to the Spanda-Karikas of Vasugupta with the Spandanirnaya of Kshemaraja, in the translation by Jaideva Singh (Motilal Banarsidass). Shared free for personal reading; not for sale and not endorsed by the author or publishers. Please read and buy the original.
CORE CLAIM
Consciousness is not a still witness but a creative pulsation (spanda). The world opens and closes with it; you are it. Catch it at the gaps: between states, between thoughts, at the peak of strong emotion, and hold the recognition that no state is not Siva.
SCOPE
Jaideva Singh's Preface and Introduction, Kshemaraja's opening verses, every verse of all four sections with the Spandanirnaya commentary and Singh's Expositions, a glossary, a master synthesis and a graded practice path: about 37,000 words.
KEY FIGURES
Vasugupta and Kallata (the authorship question); commentators Kshemaraja, Ramakantha and Utpala Bhatta; Abhinavagupta and Utpaladeva; translator Jaideva Singh, Swami Lakshman Joo and Swami Muktananda; and, as foils, Nagarjuna and the Vedantins.
BEST FOR
Meditators and readers who want the practical heart of Kashmir Saivism: the junctions, unmesa, Bhairava-mudra, the four circles of powers and bondage through words, with critical notes on polemic, supernormal powers and the guru frame.
How to Use This Guide
The Spandakarikas ("verses on vibration") make one claim and then test it from every side: the Self is not a silent witness but a living, throbbing freedom. Ultimate consciousness is spanda, a "throb" or "pulsation" that is not movement in space or time but the ceaseless self-awareness of the Divine. Whatever appears, the senses, the states of waking, dream and sleep, pleasure and pain, words and ideas, even the void of meditation, is that one pulsation either revealing itself (unmesa) or concealing itself (nimesa). Bondage is to be carried along by its particular forms; freedom is to catch hold of the pulsation itself and become "lord of the circle of powers".
For each section the guide gives:
- The core argument: what the verse says and what Kshemaraja makes it say, in the order he says it.
- Teaching notes: the ideas unpacked one at a time, with every Sanskrit technical term explained when it first appears.
- Insights: what is distinctive, subtle or easy to miss, and how the verse links to the rest of the system.
- Critical lens notes: where the text asserts rather than argues, where it is doing sectarian work against rival schools, or where the translator or the commentator shapes what you read.
- Key terms and reflection: a short glossary and practical questions or exercises.
Three warnings before starting. First, the Sanskrit verses and commentary are printed in Devanagari and much of it does not survive in the digital copy; the guide works from the Roman transliteration of each verse, which does survive, and from Singh's English. Second, you are reading two texts at once: the verses, which are compact and fairly plain, and Kshemaraja's commentary, which is learned, polemical and reads the verses through the later Trika and Krama systems. The guide keeps them apart wherever it matters. Third, Singh's "Exposition" often draws on the two older commentators, Kallata and Ramakantha, whose readings are simpler and sometimes different from Kshemaraja's. These are some of the most useful pages in the book.
The Shape of the Whole Book in One Page
Kshemaraja divides the verses (fifty-three in his numbering: 25, 7, 19 and 2) into four sections:
- Section I, Svarupa-spanda: spanda as the essential nature (verses 1 to 25). The Lord by whose "opening and shutting of the eyes" the world appears and dissolves (1). Nothing can veil Him (2). He remains the same Experient through waking, dream and sleep (3) and through pleasure and pain (4). He is neither the psychological subject nor its objects, nor a mere void (5). He is the power by which the senses work (6 to 8). Bondage is our own impurity (9); when it goes, innate knowledge and action appear (10, 11). The void of meditation is not the goal (12, 13). Only the object changes, never the Subject (14 to 16). The fully and the partly awakened (17, 18). The particular pulsations bind those who do not recognise them (19, 20). So be always alert (21). Spanda is found in extreme states: rage, joy, panic, running for one's life (22). Then prana and apana dissolve in the central channel and the yogi rises beyond (23 to 25).
- Section II, Sahaja-vidyodaya: the rise of innate knowledge (verses 26 to 32, numbered II.1 to II.7). Mantras draw their power from spanda (1, 2). Because every experience is a form of the knower, "there is no state which is not Siva" (3, 4). The whole world as play (5). Meditation on any deity, done rightly, ends in identity with Siva (6, 7).
- Section III, Vibhuti-spanda: the powers that come from spanda (verses 33 to 51, numbered III.1 to III.19). Siva fulfils the yogi's desires in waking and dream (1 to 3); knowledge of everything, mastery of hunger, omniscience (4 to 7); depression comes from ignorance (8); unmesa, the gap between two thoughts (9); the lights, sounds and tastes that appear and must not distract (10); seeing the world as Siva (11, 12); how words, through the "power of the alphabet", bind the empirical self (13 to 16); the subtle body, puryastaka, as the seat of bondage and its mastery (17 to 19).
- Section IV, Conclusion (verses 52 and 53, numbered IV.1 and IV.2). A double-meaning verse that praises both the spanda state and the guru's word, and a verse on the good that comes to those who take up this teaching.
Why This Book Matters
The Siva Sutras state the non-dual Saiva view in seventy-seven terse aphorisms. The Spandakarikas give that same view its dynamic face. Singh puts the division neatly in his Preface: in the Siva Sutras "it is the prakasa aspect of the Divine that is emphasized; in Spandakarikas, it is the vimarsa aspect". Prakasa is the light of consciousness; vimarsa is that light's awareness of itself, its freedom and power. Read together, "these two books give an integral view of Saiva philosophy".
The text is also the most practical of the early works. Again and again it points to moments in ordinary life where the pulsation can be caught: the start and end of waking and sleep, the gap between two thoughts, the instant of shock or great joy, the moment one sense hands over to another. It is a book of philosophy written as instructions for attention.
How the Book Is Laid Out
Each verse is given in Devanagari and in Roman transliteration, then in English. Then comes Kshemaraja's introduction to the verse (usually an objection that the verse answers), the Sanskrit commentary, Singh's translation of the commentary, numbered notes, and finally Singh's Exposition, a summary in his own words that often brings in Kallata and Ramakantha. A long Introduction precedes the text and a Glossary of Technical Terms (pp. 178 to 201) follows it. This guide follows the same order and keeps the verse numbering that Kshemaraja uses (I.1 to I.25, II.1 to II.7, III.1 to III.19, IV.1 and IV.2).
Preface, Blessing and the Authorship Question
The front matter tells you three things you need before reading a single verse: what Singh is trying to do (a readable translation of both verses and commentary, with notes and an exposition), whose reading he follows (the Kashmir Series text, corrected "with the assistance of Svami Laksmana Joo"), and how the tradition itself disagrees about who wrote the verses. The Blessing by Swami Muktananda adds a fourth thing, which a careful reader should notice: a modern frame in which the doctrine is presented as science.
The Preface
Singh's Preface is a page long and very clear. Three points stand out:
- Spanda as vimarsa. "According to Saivagama, the Divine Consciousness is not simply cold, inert intellection. It is rather spanda, active, dynamic, throbbing with life, creative pulsation."
- Kshemaraja's style. Singh is frank about the commentator: "He is fond of sesquipedalian compounds, long and windy sentences, but he is very profound in the comprehension of the subject and so cannot be ignored." This is the right attitude to bring to the commentary: patience with the style, alertness to the substance.
- The method of the book. Verse in two scripts, translation, Sanskrit commentary, English commentary, "copious notes", and "a running exposition of each karika in my own words". The book is dated Varanasi, 12 April 1980.
The Blessing and the Science Claim
Muktananda's Blessing (Miami, 15 April 1980) opens: "The doctrine of Spanda is scientific. Modern scientists have discovered that the world was created from the vibration of the first explosion and that the universe is still expanding. Yet so far they have not been able to find out how the first explosion occurred. However, the ancient scriptures of the Spanda doctrine have always contained the knowledge that this vibration is the Spanda or throb of the Absolute Reality." He adds that "when I meet with scientists, I always refer to the doctrine of Spanda" and that "Modern scientists will definitely make use of it."
This is a claim of resemblance presented as confirmation, and the book itself undercuts it. Singh's own Introduction (below) insists that spanda "cannot mean movement" when applied to the Divine: it is "neither physical motion, nor psychological activity", it is the "throb of the ecstasy of the Divine I-consciousness" and it "excludes all succession". A physical vibration in space and time, such as the expansion of the universe after the Big Bang, is exactly what the text says spanda is not. The analogy may be inspiring, but it is not evidence, and a reader who takes it as evidence will misread the doctrine. Treat the Blessing as devotional framing from a teacher of the 1970s and 1980s, not as part of the text's argument.
Who Wrote the Verses
The Introduction's first substantive topic is authorship, and Singh lays out the evidence fairly before reaching a conclusion:
- For Kallata. Bhaskara (in his Siva-sutra-varttika) and Bhatta Utpala (in the Spandapradipika, verse 53) say the verses were composed by Kallata, the chief disciple of Vasugupta. Utpala's line is that Kallata "duly versified the secret doctrine after receiving it from his guru Vasugupta".
- For Vasugupta. Kshemaraja and Mahesvarananda attribute the verses to Vasugupta himself, citing a closing verse that speaks of the treasure of knowledge preserved "in the cave of the heart" for "the good of Vasugupta". Singh notes that this verse "is, however, not found in the recension of Bhatta Utpala, Kallata and Ramakantha."
- Kallata's own words. Singh's decisive point is that Kallata's commentary calls the work "the Spandamrta which was strung together (drbdham) by revered Vasugupta", and "regarding himself, Kallata only claims to have brought it to the notice of the people." His conclusion: "Vasugupta actually composed the Karikas, taught them to Kallata, and Kallata only publicized them."
The question is not settled, and the stakes are higher than they look. Modern scholarship is divided; Alexis Sanderson, for example, makes Kallata the author of the Siva Sutras, the Spandakarikas and the Spandavrtti alike, as a French philological study summarises (HAL, "Enjeux spéculatifs de la philologie en contexte indien"). The same study points out what is at stake in Kshemaraja's attribution: if Vasugupta wrote the Spandakarikas, then the Siva Sutras, which Vasugupta "found", become revealed text (apauruseya) whose real author is Siva. In other words, the attribution Singh adopts is also the one that raises the status of the Siva Sutras. Kshemaraja is not a neutral witness here; he is building a canon. The Kashmir Saivism article on Wikipedia gives both options, "either composed by Vasugupta (c. 800 to 850 CE) or his student Bhatta Kallata" (Wikipedia on Kashmir Shaivism). Note too that Swami Lakshman Joo, to whom this book is dedicated, was adamant that the Kallata theory is "absolutely incorrect" (Lakshmanjoo, The Mystery of Vibrationless-Vibration), so Singh's conclusion is also his teacher's.
The Four Commentaries
Singh lists the commentaries, and you will meet all of them in the Expositions:
| Commentator | Work | Date (per Singh) | Character |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kallata | Vrtti | second and third quarter of the 9th century | "gives a simple meaning of these verses"; three sections (25, 7 and 20 verses) |
| Ramakantha | Vivrti | 10th century; a pupil of Utpaladeva | "closely followed the Vrtti of Kallata"; four sections of 16, 11, 3 and 21 verses, plus a verse of homage |
| Bhatta Utpala (Utpala Vaisnava) | Spandapradipika | 10th century; born at Narayana in Kashmir, son of Trivikrama | "consists mostly of parallel quotations from other sources" |
| Kshemaraja | Spandasandoha (on verse 1 only) and Spanda-nirnaya (whole text) | last quarter of the 10th and first quarter of the 11th century; "Abhinavagupta's cousin and pupil" | "exceedingly scholarly"; four sections (25, 7, 19 and 2) |
Kshemaraja also mentions a lost commentary by Bhatta Lollata. He wrote the full Spanda-nirnaya "at the persistent request of his pupil, Sura".
The section divisions are themselves interpretations. Ramakantha's titles, "the proved distinction of the knower from the known", "acquisition of distinct nature", "the universe is a manifestation of one's own nature", "realization of identity", read the text as a progressive path from discrimination to identity. Kshemaraja's titles, "essential nature", "rise of innate knowledge", "supernormal powers", read it as an exposition of one dynamic reality and its fruits. Kshemaraja moves Kallata's closing homage to the guru into a separate fourth section because, as Singh says, it "cannot, by any stretch of imagination, be included in Vibhuti".
Key Terms from the Front Matter
- Spanda: throb, pulsation; the dynamic self-awareness of the Divine.
- Karika: a verse in a collection on a technical subject.
- Prakasa: the light of consciousness. Vimarsa: its self-awareness and power.
- Vrtti, Vivrti, Pradipika, Nirnaya: names of commentaries ("gloss", "exposition", "lamp", "ascertainment").
Reflection
- Before reading further, write down what you think "consciousness" is. Is it more like a mirror or more like a fire? Keep the note; the book will challenge whichever you chose.
- When a teacher tells you that an old doctrine has been "proved by science", what would you need to see to agree?
What Spanda Is and the Map of the Four Sections (pp. xiii to xxiii)
Singh's Introduction does two jobs. First, it defines spanda with great care, using Abhinavagupta and Utpaladeva, so that the reader does not take "vibration" literally. Second, it summarises every verse in Kshemaraja's arrangement, which gives you a map to return to.
1. Spanda Is "Movement As It Were"
The word spanda literally means "some sort of movement" (kincit calanam). But "as applied to the Divine, it cannot mean movement." Singh quotes Abhinavagupta: if there were movement from the Divine's own nature towards another object, "it is definite movement, not some sort". Therefore "Spanda is only a throb, a heaving of spiritual rapture in the essential nature of the Divine which excludes all succession. This is the significance of the word kincit... to be interpreted as 'movement as it were.'"
Abhinavagupta's second definition (from the Isvarapratyabhijna-vimarsini I.5.14) explains the "as if": "even the immovable appears 'as if moving', because though the light of consciousness does not change in the least, yet it appears to be changing as it were."
Singh's summary: spanda is "spiritual dynamism without any movement in itself but serving as the causa sine qua non of all movements." It is "neither physical motion, nor psychological activity like pain and pleasure, nor pranic activity like hunger or thirst. It is the throb of the ecstasy of the Divine I-consciousness (vimarsa)."
2. Spanda Is Vimarsa Is Freedom
Utpaladeva gives the link to the rest of the system: the Divine is called Mahesvara, the great Lord, "because of His ever-present, immutable Self-awareness (vimarsa). That Self-awareness in its absolute Freedom constitutes Divine knowledge and activity." Spanda "is only another name of Self-awareness or Vimarsa." Kshemaraja's own gloss is "the svatantrya-sakti of the Lord", His power of absolute freedom.
Singh then gives a list worth memorising, because the commentary uses these words interchangeably: vimarsa, parasakti, svatantrya, aisvarya, kartrtva, sphuratta, sara, hrdaya and spanda are "synonymous in Saivagama". Self-awareness, supreme power, freedom, lordship, agency, flashing, essence, heart and pulsation are one thing seen from different angles.
This list is the key to the whole book. Whenever Kshemaraja says "heart", "essence", "flashing" or "freedom", you can substitute "spanda" and the sentence will still make sense. The text is not multiplying entities; it is circling one reality with many names, each catching a different facet: sphuratta its brilliance, hrdaya its centrality, kartrtva its agency, sara its being the essence of everything.
3. Unmesa and Nimesa Are Simultaneous
The first verse speaks of the Lord's unmesa (opening of the eyes, emergence) and nimesa (closing of the eyes, submergence). Singh stresses from the start that these are "only figuratively spoken of as occurring one after the other. As a matter of fact, they occur simultaneously." He quotes a traditional line: "This goddess is always engaged in exercising her energy in withdrawal and yet always appears as replete." Unlike physical energy, spanda-sakti is not depleted by activity. And: "In reality, nothing arises, and nothing subsides. It is only the divine Spanda-sakti which, though free of succession, appears in different aspects as if flashing in view and as if subsiding."
4. Spanda and the Krama School
Singh flags early that "Ksemaraja believes that there is close correlation between the spanda system and the krama system." In the first verse Kshemaraja reads "sakti-cakra-vibhava-prabhavam" in Krama terms, with the deities Srsti, Rakta Kali and the rest, and the four phases of udyoga (creative activity), avabhasana (maintenance), carvana (absorption, literally "chewing") and vilapana (dissolution into the "indefinable", anakhya).
This is a significant interpretive move, and Singh reports it without comment. The Spandakarikas themselves say nothing about twelve Kalis. Kshemaraja reads the Krama (or Mahartha) cult of the goddess Kali into the verse. He was entitled to do so as a teacher of a living tradition that integrated Spanda, Krama and Trika, but a reader should know that it is Kshemaraja's synthesis, not the verse. Kallata's simpler gloss, which Kshemaraja himself quotes, says only "the cause of the appearance of the glorious powers of the aggregate of the saktis which powers are of the nature of consciousness".
5. Map of the Four Sections
Singh's verse-by-verse summary is the best quick reference in the book. A condensed version:
| Verses | Topic (after Singh's summary) |
|---|---|
| I.1 | Spanda-sakti as unmesa and nimesa; the nature of Siva and of the empirical person alike |
| I.2 | The world is contained in spanda and comes out of it, like reflections in a mirror or a banyan in its seed |
| I.3 and I.4 | The Experient stays the same through waking, dream, deep sleep, pleasure and pain |
| I.5 | Reality is neither the psychological subject nor its experience nor mere void |
| I.6 to I.8 | The senses get their power of going out, staying and withdrawing from spanda, not from the empirical will |
| I.9 to I.11 | The three impurities block realisation; when the limited ego dissolves, innate knowledge and activity appear |
| I.12 and I.13 | The experience of void proves an Experient |
| I.14 to I.16 | Only the object changes and disappears, never the Subject |
| I.17 and I.18 | The fully awakened (suprabuddha) has spanda in all states; the partly awakened only at the start and end of each |
| I.19 and I.20 | General (samanya) and particular (visesa) spanda; the particulars bind the unawakened |
| I.21 and I.22 | Constant alertness; intense emotion and mental impasse as openings |
| I.23 to I.25 | Prana and apana merge in susumna, rise to brahmarandhra and dissolve in the ether of consciousness |
| II.1 and II.2 | Mantras draw their power from spanda and dissolve in it |
| II.3 to II.5 | No state which is not Siva; the world as play |
| II.6 and II.7 | Identity with the deity meditated on leads to identity with Siva and immortality |
| III.1 to III.3 | Siva fulfils desires in waking and dream; the alert yogi versus the ordinary dreamer |
| III.4 to III.8 | Knowledge of everything, mastery of hunger, omniscience; depression from ignorance |
| III.9 and III.10 | Unmesa at the junction of two thoughts; lights, sounds, forms and tastes as obstacles |
| III.11 and III.12 | Experiencing everything from earth to Siva as Siva |
| III.13 to III.16 | Words and ideas, the "power of the multitude of words", bind; recognising kriya-sakti as spanda liberates |
| III.17 to III.19 | The subtle body (puryastaka) holds the residues of desire; mastery of it makes one lord of the circle of powers |
| IV.1 and IV.2 | Praise of spanda and of the guru's word; the good that comes to the reader |
Singh also gives the key distinction between Sections I and II. Section I stresses nimilana samadhi, "introvertive meditation" with eyes closed, in which the individual finds spanda as the essential Self. Section II stresses unmilana samadhi, "extrovertive meditation", "possible by the rise of Sahaja vidya by which one experiences unity in the midst of diversity". This pair, inward and outward absorption, runs through the whole book.
Key Terms
- Unmesa / nimesa: opening / closing of the eyes; emergence / submergence; revelation / concealment.
- Svatantrya-sakti: the power of absolute freedom.
- Krama / Mahartha / Mahanaya: the Kashmiri school of the goddess Kali and the phases of cognition.
- Nimilana / unmilana samadhi: absorption with closed eyes (inward) / with open eyes (outward).
- Sahaja-vidya: innate, natural knowledge of unity in diversity.
Reflection
- Can you think of anything in your experience that is active without moving, such as attention, interest or love? Use it as a first image of spanda.
- Notice, today, one moment when something appears in your awareness. Is there also something that disappears at that moment?
Kshemaraja's Invocation, the Tradition and the Plan (pp. 1 to 5)
Before commenting, Kshemaraja does three things: he praises the goddess Spanda-sakti in an elaborate invocation, he tells the story of how the teaching came down from Siva through Vasugupta, and he gives a synopsis of the first section verse by verse. Together these set the frame: the text is revelation, the reader's own consciousness is the subject, and the book has a strict logical order.
1. The Invocation
The first verse of the invocation is a single long sentence. Spanda-sakti is the one "who is ever conscious of the vitality of mantra, who is the endless flash of the perfect and complete I-consciousness whose essence consists in a multitude of letters, who is the goddess embodying jnana (knowledge)". She "ever knows the totality of categories from the earth up to Siva, which is one in substance with Her own Self and is portrayed out of Her own nature on the canvas of Her own free, clear Self just as a city is reflected in a mirror." "Hail to that Energy of creative pulsation (spandasakti) of Siva (Samkari) that exults in glory all over the world."
Singh's notes unpack three images:
- Mantra here means "the I-consciousness or aham paramarsa of the Absolute", the supreme "I" that is the source of all mantra.
- Aham ("I") "contains all the letters of the Sanskrit alphabet from 'a' to 'ha'": the first and last letters. The perfect "I" holds all speech, and therefore all ideas, inside itself.
- Drgdevi, "the goddess of seeing", is spanda-sakti as knowledge. Singh adds a key teaching: "Actually there is only one Sakti, viz., Svatantrya sakti... The initial appearance of svatantrya is known as Iccha-sakti or the power of Will. Its final appearance is known as Kriya-sakti or the power of action. Its expansion is known as jnana-sakti or power of knowledge."
The second verse says Kshemaraja has already given "a small taste" of spanda in his Spandasandoha (a long commentary on verse 1 alone) and now offers "complete enjoyment". The third verse is a sales pitch to the reader: if you want "the exact interconnection of the sutras, the most excellent ascertainment of the highest Reality, pointed and subtle statement of reasoning, the right application of means, exquisite exposition... and the secret doctrine of Saivagama", then read this gloss "and obtain the wealth of spanda."
2. The Tradition
Kshemaraja's account of the origin: "the excessive greatness of Self was revealed to the exalted preceptor Vasugupta by Siva's inspiration... He received instruction in dream and thus, in Mahadeva mountain, he obtained through divine will the most esoteric Siva-sutras which were engraved on the surface of the great rock. He, by demonstrating the agreement of revelation, experience and reasoning, put together the import of the sutras in an abridged form by means of fifty-one verses which were deep in sense but were expressed in a lucid form."
Two things are worth noticing. First, the story of the rock is a legitimation narrative; it places the Siva Sutras above human authorship and the Spandakarikas one step below them, as a faithful digest. That is the canon-building point raised above. Second, the triad of agama (revelation), anubhava (experience) and yukti (reasoning) is a real methodological claim, and the book should be judged by it. As you read, ask of each verse which of the three is doing the work. Often it is reasoning, sometimes careful and sometimes thin; sometimes it is simply scripture quoted as proof.
3. The Plan of Section I
Kshemaraja's synopsis gives the logical function of each verse, and it is worth having in one place:
| Verse | Function in Kshemaraja's plan |
|---|---|
| 1 | Praise of Siva; suggests the purport of the whole |
| 2 to 5 | Establish the true nature of spanda "with valid reasoning" |
| 6 and 7 | The means of attaining it "with proper recognition" |
| 8 | Refutes an objection to the means |
| 9 | Shows the means is suitable for the goal |
| 10 | The real nature of the goal |
| 11 | Close adherence to it ends the delusion of a world separate from Siva |
| 12 and 13 | Refute the Nihilists |
| 14 to 16 | Indestructibility of spanda; "Nihilism stands completely eradicated" |
| 17 and 18 | Fully versus partly awakened; the objects of the fully awakened |
| 19 and 20 | Removing the veils; how the unawakened are veiled |
| 21 | Exhortation to constant effort |
| 22 | Life situations that open spanda |
| 23 to 25 | Stay alert to tear apart "the sleep-like veil of darkness" |
Kshemaraja's synopsis shows that he reads the text as an argument with a practical spine: nature of reality (2 to 5), means (6 to 9), goal (10, 11), refutation of rivals (12 to 16), stages (17 to 20), exhortation (21 to 25). That structure is his, but it does fit the verses well.
Reflection
- Kshemaraja claims that revelation, experience and reasoning agree. Which of the three do you trust most, and why?
- The image of a city in a mirror recurs throughout the book. Spend a minute looking at a reflection. Is there any part of the reflected scene that is not the mirror?
The Opening and Shutting of Siva's Eyes (pp. 5 to 23)
"We laud that Sankara by whose mere opening and shutting of the eyelids there is the appearance and dissolution of the world and who is the source of the glorious powers of the collective whole of the saktis." The first verse states the whole doctrine in one image: the universe is the blink of consciousness. Kshemaraja turns it into a small treatise, with seven readings of one compound, a detour into the twelve Kalis of the Krama school, and a key teaching that every appearance is also a disappearance.
The Verse
Yasyonmesanimesabhyam jagatah pralayodayau / Tam sakticakravibhavaprabhavam Sankaram stumah //
"We laud that Sankara by whose mere opening and shutting of the eyelids there is the appearance and dissolution of the world and who is the source of the glorious powers of the collective whole of the saktis (the divine energy in various forms)."
| Word | Meaning | Note |
|---|---|---|
| yasya | of whom | Siva, as one's own Self |
| unmesa | opening of the eyes | emergence, expansion, revelation |
| nimesa | shutting of the eyes | submergence, withdrawal, concealment |
| jagatah | of the world | everything "from Siva down to the earth" |
| pralaya, udaya | dissolution, appearance | note the order: dissolution comes first |
| sakti-cakra | circle or group of powers | read seven ways by Kshemaraja |
| vibhava | glory, unfoldment, play | |
| prabhava | source, cause; also "one who is free" | |
| Sankara | the one who does "sam", grace | |
| stumah | we laud | read as "we enter into" |
Commentary Walkthrough
Who is Sankara? Kshemaraja begins with an etymology: Sankara is "one who does sam" (sam karoti iti samkarah), and sam means "the grace (anugraha) which consists in enabling the aspirant to recognize the vast expanse of His Consciousness (which, in essence, is one's own consciousness)". Sankara is not a distant god but "our own essential nature".
What is praise? "Here the sense of lauding is that by considering Him as excelling the entire cosmos we enter into His being by obliterating the state of assumed agency (kalpita-pramatr-pada)." The whole treatise "is going to teach that entrance in Him i.e. identification with Him is the (real) reward of liberation in life (jivan-mukti)." The plural "we laud" expresses "our identity with all those who are worthy of His grace".
Spanda defined. The Lord, "of the nature of Light", has absolute Freedom, "of the nature of Parasakti that displays Herself in the two poles of aham (I) and visarga (creation or idam, the objective world)". "Therefore the Svatantrya Sakti (the Power of Absolute Freedom) of the Lord is called spanda." Though "not anything extra" (anadhikam api), she shows herself "as if supernumerary" (adhikam iva). The Lord is "non-moving, being of the nature of consciousness", yet His power is called spanda "in accordance with the root meaning of the word signifying slight movement (kincit calatta)". So "the essential nature of the Lord is perpetual spanda. He is never without spanda."
The polemic. "Some hold that the Highest Reality is without any activity whatsoever. But in such a case the Highest Reality being devoid of activity, all this (the universe) will be without a lord or Creative Power." Singh's note identifies the target: "The Vedantists who maintain that Brahman is sheer calm Consciousness without any activity."
Each appearance is a disappearance. This is the core teaching of the commentary. "The same principle constitutes the stage of absorption (nimesa) from the point of view of the withdrawal of the previously manifested... and from the point of view of those that are about to come into being, it is... the stage of appearance (unmesa)." Hence: "the stage of the submergence of the universe constitutes the emergence of the compactness of consciousness, so also the stage of the submergence of the compactness of consciousness constitutes the stage of the emergence of the universe."
He makes it concrete: "Even while she displays external perception like blue or internal perception like pleasure, she suppresses the (real) nature of her identity with the perceiver and also brings about the suppression of yellow etc. which was previously perceived." So every single perception is three events at once: something appears, the previous thing disappears, and the perceiver's identity with the perceived is hidden. "In order to put an end to transmigratory existence, let people of great intelligence closely understand the goddess Consciousness (pratibha) who is simultaneously of the nature of both revelation and concealment as is evident from one's own experience."
Three quoted lines. Kshemaraja points ahead to three later verses that show the same double action:
- III.9: "That is to be known as Unmesa whence another thought arises in one who is already occupied with one thought." The end of one thought is the rise of the next; between them, the source.
- III.13: "Of the limited empirical being, the rise of the empirical thought-constructs betokens at the same time the disappearance of the bliss of Supreme immortality." Every thought, for the bound person, is a small loss of the Self.
- I.9: "When the agitation ceases, then is the highest state experienced." The disappearance of agitation is the appearance of the supreme.
The ascent and descent of subjects. The Lord takes on, "by His power of absolute Freedom", the seven subjective roles: Siva, Mantramahesvara, Mantresvara, Mantra, Vijnanakala, Pralayakala and Sakala, each with its sphere of objects. In descent He "displays the succeeding aspects by suppressing the preceding ones"; in ascent, for the jnana-yogis, He "displays the preceding aspects by eliminating the succeeding ones". "So He shows everything as of the nature of everything else. The usual perception of difference is due only to limitation caused to appear by Him. The teaching of this sastra is meant to destroy this perception of difference."
The five acts in two. Kshemaraja folds the five divine acts into the verse's two: "Sthiti (maintenance), Vilaya (concealment) and anugraha (grace) are not anything other than particular forms of absorption and manifestation, therefore the five-fold divine acts have been included only in pralaya and udaya."
The Seven Readings of "Sakti-cakra-vibhava-prabhava"
Kshemaraja is a commentator who does not choose between meanings; he stacks them. He answers an objection from the Mahanaya (Krama) school, which says the acts of creation and so on are done by goddesses, so why does the verse say "He whose"? The answer is in the compound "source of the glories of the circle of powers": the goddesses are His powers.
| Reading | "Circle of powers" means | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | the twelve Kalis of the Krama school (Srsti, Rakta and the rest), with their play of creative activity, maintenance, absorption and the indefinable | Krama tradition (amnaya) |
| 2 | all objects, which exist as powers within the inner Light; "the entire gamut of entities appears (outside), because it already exists in the Lord's Self" | Utpaladeva, IPK I.5.10; agrees with Kallata |
| 3 | the world itself: "His powers constitute the whole world"; "there is no state which is not Siva" | agama and II.4 |
| 4 | the group of Vamesvari, Khecari, Gocari, Dikcari and Bhucari | esoteric teaching; I.20 |
| 5 | the group of the senses | I.6 |
| 6 | the eternal mantras | II.1 |
| 7 | the deities of the letters, Brahmi and the rest | III.13 |
He adds that prabhava can mean "one who is Free" (one who prevails), "and not dependent on others like the animals". He also offers a Bahuvrihi reading: Sankara is the one "whose manifestation comes about from the inner unfoldment of the mass of light, i.e. the divinities of the senses", so that "the recognition of the highest Lord is brought about effortlessly by the practice of perception of the inner nature." And a final reading in which the world that appears and disappears is first of all the body: "The Highest Lord even by entering the body etc. brings about the manifestation and disappearance of the world by the opening and closing of the senses."
Kshemaraja concludes that the verse gives, in brief, the four things every treatise must give: the subject matter (entry into Sankara), the means (the unfoldment of the powers), their connection (end and means) and the fruit ("Then he will become the lord of the group of saktis", III.19).
The Twelve Kalis (Singh's Note 8)
Singh's long note on the Krama Kalis is one of the most useful in the book. The twelve are arranged as four powers (creation, maintenance, withdrawal and the indefinable) applied to three levels (object, means of knowledge and subject):
| Level | Creation (srsti) | Maintenance (sthiti) | Withdrawal (samhara) | Indefinable (anakhya) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Object (prameya) | 1. Srsti Kali: the would-be creation "shines in outline in her" | 2. Rakta Kali: maintenance of the objective world through the five senses | 3. Sthitinasa Kali: the extrovert form ends and she rests within | 4. Yama Kali: beyond extrovert and introvert |
| Means of knowledge (pramana) | 5. Samhara Kali: the object is grasped within; "The object is non-different from me" | 6. Mrtyu Kali: swallows even the traces of the idea of withdrawal | 7. Bhadra (Rudra) Kali: "bha" for blossoming of objects, "dra" for dissolving them | 8. Martanda Kali: dissolves the twelve senses in the ego-feeling until they are "un-namable" |
| Subject (pramata) | 9. Paramarka Kali: the limited subject emerges, free of the limits of objects and senses but still with anava mala | 10. Kalagnirudra Kali (Mahakali): the limited subject rests in the Universal Self; "I am all this" | 11. Mahakala Kali: dissolves the "I" set against "this" in the perfect "I" | 12. Mahabhairava-ghora-canda Kali: the Akula stage beyond all words, where subject, object and knowledge dissolve |
The ultimate resting place of all is Manthana Bhairava, also called Kulesvara.
Strip away the goddess names and this is a precise phenomenology of a single act of knowing, in twelve moments. An object appears, is held, fades, and passes beyond notice; the knowing of it is taken inward, its traces dissolve, the senses themselves dissolve into the sense of "I"; then the limited "I" emerges, rests in the universal, drops its opposition to "this", and dissolves into what cannot be named. Krama practice is to watch this cycle in every perception. Read this way, the table is not mythology but a map of attention.
Singh's Exposition
Singh draws out four points:
- No contradiction in the Changeless having two aspects. "It is only Svatantrya, Freedom or Iccha, Will of Siva which brings about both manifestation and absorption." Since succession is time and Siva is above time, unmesa and nimesa are "not to be taken in the order of succession". Kshemaraja lists synonyms of this Iccha-sakti: "Spanda, sphuratta, Urmi, Bala, Udyoga, Hrdaya, Sara, Malini, Para".
- Evolution as descent and ascent. Nimesa is the "arc of descent" (avaroha-krama) "from Consciousness up to the matter"; unmesa the "arc of ascent" (aroha-krama) "from the empirical individual up to Siva-pramata". "Siva-consciousness is the upeya or the goal, the methods recommended in the book are the means (upayas)."
- Two orders of reading. Ramakantha and Utpala Bhatta pair the words crosswise: unmesa with udaya, nimesa with pralaya ("When there is unmesa, i.e. inclination towards manifestation, there is the emergence of the world"). Kshemaraja takes them both ways; in the textual order, "When there is unmesa or revelation of the essential nature of the Divine, there is the pralaya or disappearance of the world." Singh: "Both these interpretations are correct. In the first, unmesa and nimesa are construed with reference to Sakti of Siva. In the second, they are construed with reference to the svarupa or essential nature of Siva."
- Praise as entry. "The text is neither a book of poetry, nor of mere academic philosophy. It is philosophy for the practical purpose of sanctifying and divinising human nature." All the commentators agree that "we laud" suggests "samavisamah", "we have to enter or identify ourselves with His essential nature".
Critical Lens
Kshemaraja's stacking of seven meanings is a known feature of Indian commentary, but it carries a cost. When a compound can mean the Krama goddesses, the objects of the world, the senses, the mantras and the letter-deities, it no longer constrains interpretation; it becomes a peg on which the commentator hangs his whole system. The verse itself is simpler. Kallata's gloss and Singh's Exposition are the better guide to what the verse says; Kshemaraja's readings are the better guide to how the Trika of the eleventh century used it. Note also that his closing sentence invites "intelligent people who are unprejudiced and are not haughty" to compare his commentary with "the commentaries of others" (he says this at the end of the next verse). The polemic is against fellow Saivas as well as against Vedantins and Buddhists.
Key Terms
- Sankara: "maker of sam", giver of grace; Siva as one's own Self.
- Kalpita-pramatr: the "assumed" or constructed experient, the ego.
- Samavesa: absorption, entry into the Divine.
- Pratibha: the goddess Consciousness as intuitive supreme awareness, holding all within.
- Siva to Sakala: the seven grades of experient, from the highest to the fully bound.
- Upaya / upeya: means / goal.
Reflection and Practice
- Close your eyes slowly, then open them. As the room disappears, what appears? As it reappears, what disappears? Do this five times, paying attention only to the moment of change.
- In the next hour, catch one moment when a new thought arrives. What happened to the previous thought?
Nothing Can Veil Him (pp. 24 to 33)
"Inasmuch as nothing can veil His nature, there cannot be His obstruction anywhere in whom all this world rests and from whom it has come forth." The second verse answers the obvious objections to the first: what proof is there of such a Sankara, and how can He create a world without material? Kshemaraja's answer is the core of the system's logic: whatever could obstruct consciousness must itself appear, and whatever appears is already consciousness.
The Verse
Yatra sthitam idam sarvam karyam yasmacca nirgatam / Tasyanavrtarupatvan na nirodho'sti kutracit //
"Inasmuch as nothing can veil His nature, there cannot be His obstruction anywhere in whom all this world rests and from whom it has come forth."
The Objections
Kshemaraja's introduction states three objections. What is the proof that such a Sankara exists? How can He create without material? And if He is the material cause, then like a lump of clay He would disappear into His product, the pot; if He both appears and disappears, His nature changes, a cause must be found for His reappearance, and creation produces duality.
Commentary Walkthrough
Nothing can veil Him. "In this world, whatever, e.g. prana (life-force), puryastaka (the subtle body), pleasure, the blue colour, etc. that may possibly be conceived to have the capacity of veiling the Light of Consciousness is nothing if it does not come into light, and if it does come into light, then it is only the nature of Samkara whose very form is Light." Then the decisive question: "Then what is that which can obstruct or what is the meaning of obstruction?" A quotation from the Ajadapramatrsiddhi: "How can there be any restraint of His by prana which is identical with Himself?"
The world is a product of an agent. "Discarding the Consciousness as the cause of the world which is verified from one's own experience from the standpoint of memory, dream, ideation, creation by yogis, it is not proper to suppose pradhana, atom etc. to be the cause of the world, for such a cause has neither proof nor reasoning in its support." Following the Isvarapratyabhijna, "causality in the case of the insentient cannot be proved." A product is "that which is produced by the action of an agent", and "It is never witnessed that the produced product such as the jar can conceal the nature of the agent such as the potter."
Kshemaraja's grammatical trick. To answer each further objection he re-reads the verse, repeating one phrase and moving the particle "ca":
- "Only as resting in Him is all this world come forth." The world comes out of consciousness because it was already in it, as "the great banyan tree lies only in the form of potency in the seed" (Paratrisika, verse 24).
- "From whom even when it has come forth, it is still resting there." "That (the world) has not come out from him as does a walnut from a bag. Rather the self-same Lord through His absolute Freedom manifesting, on His own background like a city in a mirror, the world as if different from Him though non-different, abides in Himself."
- Even in dissolution, "the created world in the state of dissolution abides in Him as identical with Himself. There is no other annihilation of it in the form of a void." He quotes the Svacchanda Tantra: "It is (really) non-void (asunyam) which is said to be void, for sunya only means abhava or absence of objects."
Self-proving principle. "This principle is all-pervading, eternal, full of all powers, self-luminous, and eternally existent. In order to prove its existence, no poor means of proof which can reveal only an unknown thing can ever be appropriately applicable." Rather, "the means of proof and all other things themselves depend on the truth of this principle." Abhinavagupta: "He the great God is the utmost life of even those proofs which constitute the life of all things" (Tantraloka I.55).
The denier proves what he denies. "There cannot be an obstruction to or negation of one's real nature in any case even though there may be existing somewhere an experient like the Buddhist who maintains that there is no Self... Because if he that is the denier of that is not already existent as a reality, then his denial becomes a picture without a canvas." "Thus the reality of the Spanda principle has been tacitly affirmed without using any words, even by him who had come forward to deny it."
All theisms meditate on this. "That which is the object of meditation in all the theistic schools is not anything different from the spanda principle. The diversity of meditation appears entirely owing to the absolute Freedom of this Spanda principle."
The practice. "Since there is no obstruction to this principle whether in the state of cessation... or in the state of expansion..., therefore the yogi should be intent on entrance in his essential nature in both nimilana and unmilana samadhi." Singh's note: nimilana is "the inward meditative condition with closed eyes, in which the individual consciousness gets absorbed into the Universal"; unmilana is "that state of the mind in which, even when the eyes are open, the external world appears as Universal Consciousness or Siva."
Singh's Exposition
"The world... exists in Siva... even as the reflection of a city may be said to exist in a mirror." "Siva is the world from the point of view of appearance, and the world is Siva from the point of view of Reality. Siva is both transcendent to and immanent in the world, both visvottirna and visvamaya." Since the world owes its existence to Him, "it cannot conceal Him even as a pot cannot conceal the potter". The practical implication: "Since the real or metaphysical Self of each individual is essentially Siva, the world cannot throw a pall over it. Only the individual has to recognise his Self."
Critical Lens
The argument "whatever obstructs consciousness must appear, so it is consciousness" is powerful but has a hidden step. It moves from "everything I know is known in consciousness" (true, almost by definition) to "everything is made of consciousness" (a metaphysical claim). A realist would say that the jar appears in consciousness without being consciousness. Kshemaraja's answer, borrowed from Utpaladeva, is that an object that never appeared could not be said to exist; but that is a claim about what can be asserted, not obviously about what there is. The "denier proves the Self" argument has a similar shape: it shows that denying requires some experient, not that the experient is the eternal, all-powerful Siva. These arguments are strongest as pointers to examine one's own experience, which is how Kshemaraja finally uses them, and weakest as proofs against a rival who does not already share the premise. Note too the remark that causality of the insentient "cannot be proved": this is a whole argument from the Isvarapratyabhijna compressed into a clause, and it is asserted here, not argued.
Key Terms
- Nirodha: obstruction, restraint.
- Anavrta: unveiled, that which cannot be covered.
- Puryastaka: the "city of eight", the subtle body.
- Visvottirna / visvamaya: transcending the universe / made of the universe.
- Adi-siddha: established from the beginning, before any proof or denial.
- Parinama / vivarta: real transformation / illusory appearance (developed in I.3).
Reflection
- Try to find something in your experience that hides awareness itself. Notice that whatever you find, you found it in awareness.
- Look at a pot, a cup or a pen. In what sense does it "contain" the maker who made it?
The Same Experient Through Waking, Dream and Sleep (pp. 34 to 39)
"Even though differing states like waking etc. occur in which, however, that Spanda principle remains identically the same, that Spanda principle never departs from its own nature as the identical Experient (in all the differing states)." The objection is simple: if Siva cannot be veiled, why is He not experienced in waking? The verse answers that He is, as the one who experiences. Kshemaraja then uses the verse to reject both transformation (parinama) and illusion (vivarta) theories of the world.
The Verse
Jagradadivibhede'pi tadabhinne prasarpati / Nivartate nijannaiva svabhavadupalabdhrtah //
Commentary Walkthrough
The states, ordinary and yogic. The states meant are "waking, dream, and deep sleep well-known among common people" and also "the corresponding states of dharana (concentration), dhyana (meditation) and intense absorption (samadhi), well known among the yogins". In all of them the spanda principle "never departs from its own invariable nature as the Self of all and as the Experient of every state. If that principle were to depart, the states of waking etc. being devoid of its light would not appear at all."
How we know the Experient is there in deep sleep. In waking and dream the Experient is "proved from Self-experience". In deep sleep it is "not similarly known directly, yet it is proved from subsequent memory of it (the deep sleep) which could not otherwise justifiably occur unless there was a previous experience of that deep sleep." The objects of experience, "such as state of deep sleep etc. may through its greatness, deviate with pleasure. Where is the harm in this?"
"Not separate from that". The phrase tadabhinne is read as containing a reason (Singh calls it hetugarbha visesana, "an adjective which contains implicitly a reason"): because the states are identical with Siva, who is light, they are forms of light; "how can that which is identical with the other remain if the other departs?" Or, read differently, "Spanda principle even while there are differing states like waking, etc. flows on, i.e. assumes diversity. It never departs from its nature."
Against transformation (Samkhya, Pancaratra). "If the manifold states being transformation of consciousness were even slightly different from pure consciousness, then on their transformation, consciousness would also be slightly transformed. On the transformation of consciousness itself, nothing would appear." Singh's note gives the example: "Just as when milk is transformed into curd, the milk has disappeared... Even so if consciousness is transformed into the manifold states, it can no longer remain consciousness." The Srikirana tantra (now lost): "There can be transformation only of the insentient."
Against illusion (grammarians and Vedantins). "That which is perceived cannot be unreal, for if it be unreal, there would be the predicament of the Brahman principle also becoming unreal." Vivarta implies "unreality, separation and the assumption of another form", and none of these fits.
The Trika in the states. "Inasmuch as the Lord manifests the differing states of waking, etc., in the manifestation of that difference itself He manifests His identity." Singh's note: "Without the Experient's continuing as identical in the different states, their differences themselves cannot be experienced." Thus He shines "in difference by His power of apara, in identity by His power of para, in the form of identity in diversity by His power of parapara". This is the "unparalleled Trika principle".
Singh's Exposition
Kallata: "Since the Experient remains the same in all the three states... there is no deviation in his nature, just as the lotus remains the same in all its five parts." A verse quoted by Utpala Bhatta: "This difference is of the states not of the Experient who holds them... just as there is difference in the sprouts etc. of the lotus, but not in the sakti (power) of the lotus."
"The differences themselves point to one common identical Reality which acts as anusandhata, i.e. which joins those differing states into the unity of the experience of one individual in the form 'I who was awake, had a dream in sleep and then enjoyed sound sleep.'"
The practice: "One who contemplates zealously over the identity of the Experient in the midst of the changing states of experience becomes identified with Siva."
Critical Lens
The memory argument for an experient in deep sleep ("I slept well") is classical and shared with Advaita Vedanta, which makes it ironic that the same commentary is attacking the Vedantins. Modern readers should note that it is contested: someone might say we infer we slept well from how we feel on waking, rather than remembering an experience. The argument against vivarta also needs care. Advaita does not say the world is unreal in the sense of non-existent; it gives it a middle, "indeterminable" status. Kshemaraja's charge that vivarta would make Brahman unreal works only against a crude version. This is a pattern: the rival views are often presented in their weakest form.
Key Terms
- Jagrat, svapna, susupti: waking, dream, deep sleep.
- Dharana, dhyana, samadhi: concentration, meditation, absorption.
- Upalabdhr: the perceiver, the Experient.
- Anusandhana / anusandhata: synthesis, joining / the one who joins.
- Para, parapara, apara: the three powers of identity, identity in difference and difference; the "Trika".
Reflection
- Tonight, as you fall asleep, notice the last moment you can notice. Tomorrow, as you wake, notice the first. Who notices both?
- Write the sentence "I who was awake, dreamed and slept" and ask what the "I" in it refers to.
"I Am Happy, I Am Miserable" (pp. 40 to 44)
"I am happy, I am miserable, I am attached: these and other cognitions have their being evidently in another in which the states of happiness, misery etc. are strung together." One verse is used to refute two rivals: the Buddhists, who say there is only a stream of momentary cognitions and no knower, and the Mimamsakas, who say the Self is what is known in "I" tinged by pleasure and pain. Kshemaraja's answer is that the states are beads; there must be a string.
The Verse
Aham sukhi ca duhkhi ca raktasca ityadisamvidah / sukhadyavasthanusyute vartante'nyatra tah sphutam //
Commentary Walkthrough
Against the Buddhist. "The same I who am happy, am miserable, am attached... these cognitions or experiences abide in another which is the possessor of these states (avasthatr)." Otherwise "the interconnection (anusandhana) of the ephemeral cognitions and the ideas born of their residual traces will not be possible, for those cognitions disappear as soon as they arise and cannot leave behind any traces." The image: pleasure, pain and the rest "stay inwardly as flowers are strung together in the form of a wreath in a string."
On memory, the Buddhist view is that memory is "born of the residual traces of the previous experience, and is, as such, only a form tinged with the previous experience. Thus it can only be similar to the previous experience." Singh's note: "Similarity is not sameness. Without the belief in the sameness of the past experience, memory is not possible. And without an identical experient who can connect the past experience with the present, there cannot be any sameness of experience."
Kshemaraja then stops himself: "Enough of these subtleties which will only prove to be unpleasant to students of tender heart. Seekers after such subtleties may look into Pratyabhijna."
Against the Mimamsaka. Here "in another" is read as "in the puryastaka experient", the subtle-body self. Pleasure and pain do belong to that self. But the real Self "is not always tarnished by the conditions of pleasure, pain, etc., but is rather of the nature of consciousness. When He by His own impurity... conceals his essential nature and appears in that state, then He is in the Puryastaka state." Even then, "pleasure etc. cannot obstruct His real nature."
Why "happy" and not "fat"? The verse chooses "I am happy" rather than "I am thin, I am fat" for a reason: "One recognises one's essential nature as Siva by submerging his Puryastaka state which is full of experiences like pleasure, etc. in the inner essential Self and also by dissolving along with it the external aspect consisting of the body, jar, etc. Thus one should always make an earnest effort for allaying the Puryastaka." The verse moves the identification inward one layer, from body to subtle body, so that it can be dissolved from there.
Singh's Exposition
Singh draws attention to the plural "samvidah". These cognitions "are not the same samvid which is one identical, uniform consciousness underlying all other samvids." Ramakantha: "Samvit or Consciousness in its highest sense is really one, the Experient of all, flashing forth as 'I'. On account of the absence of that awareness brought about by maya-sakti, it becomes the cognizer of such impermanent incidental experience... Really speaking these are the states of buddhi... and the real Experient on account of its co-relation with buddhi etc. misconceives these states as his own."
Ramakantha again: "He pervades all the preceding and the succeeding states... he provides that synthetic unity which serves as the foundation of all pragmatic life."
Singh adds: "It is this important truth which the great German philosopher Kant expressed after nearly one thousand years, in his famous concept of the 'synthetic unity of apperception'."
Critical Lens
The Kant comparison is suggestive but loose. Kant's "transcendental unity of apperception" is a formal condition of experience, the "I think" that must be able to accompany all my representations. Kant explicitly denies that we can know this "I" as a substance, let alone as a divine, eternal Self; that inference is exactly the error he criticises in his "Paralogisms". Ramakantha's Experient is a metaphysical reality to be realised. The two share the point that experience needs unity; they part company on what that unity is. A reader should also notice the Buddhist response, which the text does not give: Buddhist philosophers (Dharmakirti's school) developed detailed accounts of memory and continuity without a permanent self, and the Pratyabhijna debate with them is long and serious. Kshemaraja's "students of tender heart" remark shows that he knows he is giving only the conclusion.
Key Terms
- Samvid / samvidah: consciousness / particular cognitions.
- Avasthatr: the possessor of states.
- Anusyuta: strung through, threaded.
- Ksanikavada: the Buddhist doctrine of momentariness.
- Buddhi: the determinative intellect, which takes on the role of the self.
Reflection
- Say "I am happy" and then "I am tired". What stays the same between the two sentences?
- Recall a memory from childhood. Is the one remembering the same as the one who had the experience? How do you know?
Neither Pleasure Nor Pain, Neither Subject Nor Object (pp. 45 to 50)
"Wherein neither pain, nor pleasure, nor object, nor subject, exists, nor wherein does even insentiency exist, that, in the highest sense, is that Spanda principle." After four verses of argument, the text makes its first positive statement of reality, in negative form. Kshemaraja uses it to dismiss five rival schools in a sentence, and Singh uses Ramakantha to resolve an apparent contradiction with verse 3.
The Verse
Na duhkham na sukham yatra na grahyam grahakam na ca / Na casti mudhabhavo'pi tadasti paramarthatah //
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| duhkha, sukha | pain, pleasure |
| grahya, grahaka | the grasped (object), the grasper (subject) |
| mudhabhava | insentiency, dullness; also "mere void" |
| paramarthatah | in the highest sense |
Commentary Walkthrough
Experienced things are consciousness. Inner objects like pleasure, outer objects like blue, "and whatever subject there is like the puryastaka, body and senses have evidently no existence like the stage of deep sleep as long as they are not experienced. When they are experienced, then being experienced, they are of the nature of consciousness." Utpaladeva: "The object that is made manifest is of the nature of the light of consciousness. What is not light cannot be said to exist." (IPK I.5.3)
Not a void. Objection: then Reality is mere void. Reply: "Insentiency is either manifest or non-manifest. If it is non-manifest, how can it be said to exist at all. If it is manifest, then because of its being manifest, it is nothing else but light."
Not the Vedantin's Brahman. In a second reading, the "insentiency" denied is "insentiency as understood by the vedantists, viz. as 'Brahman', i.e. mere light devoid of the supreme power of vimarsa". "Such Brahman without the power of Spanda in the form of absolute Freedom would be mere lifeless, insentient, inert matter." Utpaladeva: "People know vimarsa as the very nature of the light of consciousness. Otherwise light even if reflecting things would be insentient like a crystal." (IPK I.5.11) And Bhatta Nayaka's verse: "O Lord, how much fruit can this great Brahman being a eunuch bear if thy beautiful Sakti were not there to stimulate."
Five schools dismissed. "By this karika the author has declared that ultimate Reality is only of the form of Spanda-Sakti by repeatedly pointing out the non-reality, on account of untenability of the views of the Bauddhas who maintain that Reality is a continuum of consciousness in the form of pleasure, etc., of the Carvakas who maintain that reality is only the subject affected by pleasure, etc., of the followers of Samkhya who maintain the plurality of the subject and the object, of the nihilists who maintain the absence of everything, of the Vedantists who maintain that Brahman is only prakasa (light) without any activity."
For the practitioner. "When in that noble person who attentively pursues the teaching, the Spanda principle... becomes manifest, then even when experiences of pain, pleasure, object, subject or their absence occur, they are considered by him as naught, because to him everything appears only as the quintessence of the delight of Spanda." Utpaladeva's hymn: "That is the path pertaining to Sankara in which pains become pleasure, poison becomes nectar, and the world that binds the soul becomes liberation." (Stotravali 20.12)
Singh's Exposition: Is the Self the Experient or Not?
Kallata: Siva "is untouched, unaffected by the experiences of pleasure, pain, etc." for two reasons: they are "passing phases of experience, perishing in an instant", while the Self is eternal; and "they arise from thought-constructs (sankalpotthah), whereas the Self is nirvikalpa". Ramakantha: "By the rejection of pleasure, etc., it is the objectivity of Self that is rejected." The Self "can never be reduced to an object, it is the eternal Subject."
Then the apparent contradiction. Verse 3 says He never departs from His nature as Experient; verse 5 says He is neither subject nor object. Ramakantha: "By subject here, what is intended to be said is the mayiya pramata, i.e. the empirical subject, not the real, metempirical Self, for he has been explained only as the Eternal Experient. Thus the psychosomatic subject is not that Reality."
The mystic application: "he who realizes this truth is never affected by the misfortunes of life."
Critical Lens
"Brahman as a eunuch" is sectarian rhetoric, and it is worth being clear about what is being caricatured. Advaita does not say Brahman is "inert matter"; it says Brahman is pure consciousness (cit) and bliss (ananda), and that activity belongs to maya. The real disagreement is whether agency and self-awareness belong to the Absolute itself or only to its appearance. That is a serious philosophical question, and the Saiva answer has real strengths (it explains why there is a world at all). But the rhetoric of "lifeless", "insentient" and "eunuch" is persuasion, not argument. Likewise the five-school dismissal in one sentence is a summary of conclusions reached elsewhere (in the Isvarapratyabhijna), not a refutation in this text. Finally, the promise that the realiser is "never affected by the misfortunes of life" is a claim the reader cannot check in advance, and it sits uneasily with the text's own later teaching (III.8) that depression arises from ignorance and departs with it, which implies a process, not an instant immunity.
Key Terms
- Grahya / grahaka: object / subject.
- Mayiya pramata: the subject produced by maya, the empirical self.
- Nirvikalpa: free of thought-constructs.
- Sankalpa / vikalpa: thought-construct, idea.
Reflection
- Notice a pain or pleasure now. Is it the knower, or something known?
- Then notice the "I" that has the pain. Is that "I" the knower, or something known? Go as far back as you can.
The Power Behind the Senses (pp. 51 to 56)
"That principle should be examined with great care and reverence by which this group of senses, though insentient, acts as a sentient force by itself, and along with the inner group of senses, goes towards objects, takes pleasure in their maintenance, and withdraws into itself, because this natural freedom of it prevails everywhere." After establishing what spanda is, the text gives its first means: watch the senses. Every act of seeing, hearing or touching goes out, rests on its object and comes back. That cycle is not powered by the senses themselves; look for what powers it.
The Verses
Yatah karana-vargo'yam vimudho'mudhavat svayam / Sahantarena cakrena pravrtti-sthiti-samhrtih //6 Labhate tatprayatnena pariksyam tattvam adarat / Yatah svatantrata tasya sarvatreyam akrtrima //7
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| karana-varga | the group of senses (thirteen: five of perception, five of action, manas, buddhi, ahamkara) |
| vimudha / amudhavat | insentient / as if sentient |
| antara cakra | the inner circle (disputed, see below) |
| pravrtti, sthiti, samhrti | going forth, staying, withdrawing |
| pariksyam | should be examined |
| adarat | with reverence, care |
| svatantrata akrtrima | natural, uncreated freedom |
Commentary Walkthrough
Link to the Siva Sutras. The principle to be examined is the one "finally ascertained with the exposition of 'Udyamo Bhairavah' given in Siva-sutras" (I.5): "Bhairava is the upsurge." It should be examined in four ways, which match the divine acts: "as the cessation of all differences (in the state of dissolution), as the expansion of one's own power (in the state of manifestation), as cherishing of the perfect inner nature (in the state of maintenance) and in the form of the emergence of the nature of Bhairava."
Which senses? "This group of senses" means the ordinary sense organs, "not karanesvari-varga (the group of the divinities of the senses) which is described in the sastras, for being always imperceptible, it cannot be referred to as 'this'." The senses are "distinctly insentient", "appearing as insentient owing to the influence of Maya". Yet they acquire, "like the sentient, the power of going forth, staying, and withdrawing."
What is the "inner circle"? Kshemaraja rejects a rival view (Singh's note: it is "according to Ksemaraja, wrong") that "inner circle" means the inner mental organs or the subtle body, since these are already included in the thirteen senses. The "inner circle" is the karanesvaris, the sense-divinities, which are "of the nature of Consciousness-bliss". The whole sentence then means: Sankara "manifests simultaneously as one the group of sense-divinities which is the quintessence of consciousness and the group of senses which is apparently insentient and makes them perform such acts as moving towards objects, staying there (for a short while) and then withdrawing."
The teaching method. Kshemaraja concedes something important: "Though from the esoteric point of view there is no such thing as insentient group of senses, rather it is the sense-divinities which are of the nature of consciousness that expand in that way, still in this world a pupil has to be taught at first according to well-known beliefs and then gradually he has to be led to the teaching of esoteric matters."
The practice. "One should, by watching carefully the group of one's own sense divinities, presiding over the functions of forthgoing etc. of the sense-organs, carefully examine one's essential Self identical with Sankara who impels both the group of senses and the group of sense-divinities." And it is easy: "This alone can be examined, because by the aforesaid reasoning, it is easy means."
Utpaladeva's verse catches the spirit: "These sense-activities of mine may, in their joy, have full play in their objects. But, O Lord, grant that I may not have the temerity of losing even for a moment and even slightly the enjoyment of the bliss of identity with thee." (Stotravali VIII.5)
Four meanings of "should be examined". Kshemaraja applies Panini's rule on the gerundive suffix: it means worthiness (nothing is more worth examining than one's own nature), practicability (it can be done), timeliness and command. Singh's note on timeliness is the practical heart of the verse: "When the senses are functioning and are engaged in their objects, that is the exact time when one should examine the power behind the senses that makes them function in that way."
Against the materialists. By showing that the senses borrow their sentience, "the author has incidentally refuted the view of Carvakas who attribute consciousness to the senses."
Natural freedom. Singh's note quotes Ramakantha on "akrtrima": the Self's freedom "is not dependent on any material cause or any other auxiliary cause (in achieving its object), because it is self-sufficient to accomplish everything by its mere Will."
Singh's Exposition
"People in general and the materialists in particular think that it is the senses which carry out the function of pravrtti, sthiti and samhrti... This verse teaches that the senses do not have the power of these functions in themselves; they derive this power from something else. That something else should be reverentially examined."
"It is because this Self is not perceptible as an object, therefore we are unaware of it. This has to be known inwardly as the Seer of all the seen." Utpala Bhatta's quoted verse: "Like the eye, Brahma is not the seen, like the eye, it is only the seer. Its ascertainment is only within One's own Self; it is not an object of sight like a jar."
This is the first instruction in the book that anyone can try immediately, and it is subtle. It does not ask you to stop the senses or withdraw from the world. It asks you to notice the going-out, the resting and the coming-back of each act of sensing, and to ask what does it. The "sense-divinities" are a way of saying that the senses, looked at from inside, are not dead instruments but living powers of the one consciousness. The eye-verse from Utpala Bhatta gives the reason it is hard: the seer cannot be seen as an object, any more than the eye can see itself.
Critical Lens
Kshemaraja's admission that a pupil is "taught at first according to well-known beliefs and then gradually led" to the esoteric view is honest, and it also tells you how to read the whole commentary. Statements about the senses being "insentient" are provisional; the final view is that everything is consciousness. This method (called graded teaching) is common in Indian traditions and has a cost: it lets a teacher affirm and deny the same proposition at different levels, which makes the system very hard to refute. As for the Carvakas, the refutation is simply that "self-experience bears witness" that the senses borrow their power, which is precisely what a materialist would deny. The verse is better read as an invitation to look than as an argument against a rival.
Key Terms
- Karana / indriya: instrument, sense.
- Karanesvari: the "goddess of the instrument", the conscious power behind each sense.
- Pravrtti, sthiti, samhrti: going forth, staying, withdrawing; the three divine acts in each perception.
- Akrtrima: natural, not made.
Reflection and Practice
- Look at an object. Notice the moment the looking "arrives" at it, the moment it rests there, and the moment it lets go. Do this for three different objects.
- Listen to a sound until it ends. What does the hearing do when there is nothing left to hear?
The Goad of Desire (pp. 57 to 60)
"The empirical individual cannot drive the goad of desire. But by coming in contact with the power of the Self, he becomes equal to that principle." The objection is twofold. First, we direct our senses by our own will, like a farmer using a scythe, so why credit spanda? Second, our desire always runs outward; it does not want to examine the Self. The verse answers both: the will is not the driver, and the Self is reached not by desire but by contact.
The Verse
Na hicchanodanasyayam prerakatvena vartate / Api tvatmabalasparsat purusastatsamo bhavet //
Commentary Walkthrough
The empirical person is not the driver. "Of the goad of desire" means that the individual "does not set out to move the senses". He "becomes equal to it by the contact, i.e. by the entrance into him, to some extent, of the power of the Self". The sense-group "acquires sentiency by the consecration of the drops of blissful sap of I-consciousness". Spanda "by infusing consciousness into the supposed experient makes him capable of effecting the movement, etc. of the senses by virtue of which he is full of the erroneous conception, 'I am directing the senses'."
The regress argument. "If it is maintained that one directs the senses by an internal sense which uses a goad called desire, then that sense called desire being itself of the nature of the directed would require another sense for setting it in motion, and that in its turn would require another and so on. Thus there would be regressus ad infinitum."
The second objection. Kshemaraja reads the first line as a concession: true, "this empirical individual cannot move his desire to examine the Spanda-principle, nor is he capable of experiencing that reality by desire, because it is beyond the range of thought." But "when, calming down his desire which is in pursuit of objects of pleasure by at first allowing it to have its enjoyment, he contacts the Spanda-principle which is the power of the inner Self... then he becomes equal to that Spanda-principle."
Why "touch"? "The expression 'by the touch of the power of Self' has been used, because the quality of touch is predominant in the stage of Sakti."
Singh's Exposition
"Man falsely imagines that he moves his senses to perform their respective functions by the power of his will or desire. His so-called desire has no power of its own." One has to acquire spanda "neither by weaving intellectual cobwebs, nor by maiming desire, but by surrendering all desires, the entire personal will to the Divine." He quotes Tennyson: "Our wills are ours, we know not how; Our wills are ours, to make them thine." (Singh's text runs the lines together.) "When the personal citta or mind completely empties itself, then is it truly filled."
On touch: "while Sakti, the Divine Creative Power rejects all the perceptual qualities like rupa, rasa, gandha, etc. she retains sparsa or touch. How is that Reality to be touched? Ksemaraja says: 'Tatsamavesat', i.e. by penetration, by diving mentally into its innermost depth. This is the mystic union."
Two practical teachings are packed into this verse. First, you cannot want your way into the Self, because wanting is itself an outward movement powered by what you are looking for. Second, Kshemaraja's advice is not ascetic: calm desire "by at first allowing it to have its enjoyment". Neither suppress nor chase; let a desire complete itself and notice the stillness that follows, which is the moment of contact. The Tantric yogi's characteristic subtle sense, touch, names the felt quality of that contact: not a vision, not a sound, but a kind of inner pressure or presence.
Critical Lens
The regress argument is elegant but proves less than it seems. It shows that desire cannot be moved by a further desire forever; it does not show that the stopping point must be a universal divine consciousness, rather than, say, the brain or the organism. And notice a tension between Singh and Kshemaraja: Singh speaks of "surrendering the entire personal will", a devotional language close to Christian or Vaisnava piety (hence Tennyson), while Kshemaraja speaks of contact through which the person "becomes equal to that principle", a language of identity and power. The two are compatible, but they are different emphases, and Singh's is gentler than the source.
Key Terms
- Iccha / nodana: desire, will / goad, impulse.
- Atmabala: the power or strength of the Self.
- Sparsa: touch, the subtle sense proper to Sakti.
- Samavesa: penetration, immersion.
Reflection
- Next time you decide to move your hand, watch closely. Can you find the moment you "made" the decision?
- Let one small desire (for water, for a stretch) complete itself fully. What is there in the moment after?
When Agitation Ceases (pp. 60 to 64)
"When the perturbation of that empirical individual who is incapacitated by his own impurity and is attached to actions disappears, then the highest state appears." If we are divine, why do we need the "touch" of the Self? Because we are incapacitated by our own impurity. This verse gives the system's account of the three malas and its simplest statement of the goal: the dissolution of ksobha, agitation.
The Verse
Nijasuddhyasamarthasya kartavyesv abhilasinah / Yada ksobhah praliyeta tada syat paramam padam //
Commentary Walkthrough
Kshemaraja explains "one's own impurity" as the three malas, each a contraction of one of the three divine powers:
| Mala | Which power is contracted | How (per Kshemaraja and Singh's note) |
|---|---|---|
| Anava mala | Iccha-sakti, will | "the consciousness of imperfection"; arises "owing to non-contemplation of His essential nature which is brought into play by the absolute Freedom of Siva Himself"; "the innate ignorance of one's essential nature" |
| Mayiya mala | Jnana-sakti, knowledge | polluted by the five kancukas, omniscience "becomes reduced to limited knowledge and at last it acquires utmost limitation in the formation of the psychic apparatus and the organs of sense"; "bhinna vedya pratha", consciousness of difference |
| Karma mala | Kriya-sakti, action | omnipotence "reduced to limited activity till at last by the formation of the organs of action, the empirical individual gets limited to the utmost extent. He thus performs good and bad acts" |
"Thus by such impurity, the individual becomes devoid of omniscience and omnipotence."
Attached to actions. Incapacitated, "he is attached to all kinds of actions, worldly and those prescribed by the scriptures. On account of the non-attainment of all his desired objects, he is distracted by his desires and is unable to find rest in his essential nature even for a moment."
Dissolution of agitation. "When by a firm support of the reasoning already mentioned and also to be mentioned later on and of self-experience, his perturbation... thoroughly dissolves through the vanishing of the misconception of the not-Self as the Self and of the Self as the not-self, then the highest state, viz. the spanda-principle will emerge, i.e. will come within the range of recognition." And: "Not that the Spanda-principle is something that comes into existence only at that time, for it is eternal (only its recognition is new)."
Vijnanabhairava, verse 138: "O dear one, when the ideating mind (manas), the ascertaining intellect (buddhi), the vital energy (prana sakti) and the limited experient, I, this set of four dissolves, then the previously described state of Bhairava appears."
Mala is not a substance. "Those who by the phrase 'one's own impurity' think that there is a separate substance called mala (dross) have been indirectly criticized." Singh's note: "Mala does not mean an impure substance but only limiting condition."
Singh's Exposition
"If man is really divine, why is he so imperfect...?" The answer lies in "the divine plan of evolution", which "contains two movements": first "gradual descent of the Self in inconscient matter", in which the person forgets his nature (anava), gets "confined to subtle and gross bodies" (mayiya), and accumulates impressions of acts "which act as a strong force dragging him down" (karma). "It is only at the human level that ascent to the divine status can start. The main obstacle in his ascent is his pseudo-self that arrogates to itself the status of the main actor in the drama. This pseudo-self has been called ksobha in the verse, for it is this that is responsible for all the fret and fever of life. When this is dissolved, then Self-forgetfulness is replaced by Self-recollection and man's evolution is complete."
Critical Lens
The rejection of mala as a substance is aimed at the dualist Saiva Siddhanta, for whom mala is a real, beginningless substance that only Siva's grace can ripen and remove. This is one of the deepest disagreements within Saivism, and it is easy to miss here because the remark is only one sentence. Note also Singh's language of "evolution", "the divine plan" and "only at the human level can ascent start". This is close to Sri Aurobindo's evolutionary vision, which was influential in the India of Singh's time; the idea that the human level is the unique turning point is not stated in the verse or the commentary. Singh is doing what every translator does, reading through his own frame, and it is worth knowing which frame it is.
Key Terms
- Mala: limiting condition, "impurity". Anava, mayiya, karma.
- Kancuka: the five "sheaths" of maya that limit the powers.
- Ksobha: agitation, perturbation; the pseudo-self.
- Paramam padam: the highest state.
Reflection
- Notice the "fret and fever" in yourself right now. Is there a sense of "I must" behind it?
- Recall a moment when agitation simply stopped. What was there in its place?
Then Innate Knowledge and Action Shine (pp. 64 to 66)
"Then will flash forth his innate nature characterized by cognition and activity, by which he (the experient) then knows and does all that is desired (by him)." The objection is one that Vedantins and Buddhists would welcome: if the agitated ego dissolves, reality will be "like a waveless ocean", inactive. No, says the verse; what dissolves is the borrowed agency. What appears is the real one.
The Verse
Tadasyakrtrimo dharmo jnatvakartrtvalaksanah / Yatas tadepsitam sarvam janati ca karoti ca //
Commentary Walkthrough
"Then" is said "with reference to the pupil who is to be instructed". "Innate nature" is "Freedom, which is the nature of the highest Lord". Its "everpresent characteristic" is "Jnana (knowledge) and kriya (activity) of the nature of light and bliss which are harmoniously blended". At entry into the supreme state, "all that he desired to know or to do at the time of the desire to enter that state, he is able to know and do."
A grammatical point with doctrinal weight: "The particle ca repeated twice (attached to janati and karoti) suggests simultaneity, not, as some think, identity of knowledge and activity." Their identity is already given by the compound "characterized by knowledge and activity".
Singh's Exposition
"The knowledge and activity of the empirical individual are krtrima (artificial) because firstly they are limited, secondly they are borrowed, i.e. derived from another source." "When the limited ego of the individual is dissolved and his perturbation ceases, then he does not become inert like stone." He quotes a passage: "Really speaking there is one sakti of the Divine, viz. the consciousness of his essential nature as I. The same Sakti in the form of perceiving or feeling, is known as jnana or knowledge; in the form of its volitional activity, it is known as kriya or activity."
"Artificial" here does not mean "fake"; it means limited and borrowed. Your present knowing and doing are real, but they are the Self's knowing and doing seen through a keyhole. The verse's promise is not that you gain new powers from outside but that the keyhole opens. This is why the text can say both that the empirical will is not the driver (I.8) and that the liberated person "knows and does all that is desired": it is the same power, first contracted, then not.
Critical Lens
"Knows and does all that is desired" is a large claim. Kshemaraja limits it to what was desired "at the time of the desire to enter that state", which can be read modestly: at the moment of entry, the aspiration is fulfilled. Later verses (Section III) make much stronger claims about powers, and the reader should keep the modest and the strong readings separate. The text never gives a test by which the claim could fail.
Key Terms
- Akrtrima dharma: innate nature.
- Jnatva / kartrtva: knowership / agency.
- Krtrima: artificial, i.e. limited and borrowed.
Reflection
- Think of a moment when you acted without hesitation or self-consciousness, fully absorbed. Was the action weaker or stronger than usual?
- In what sense is your present knowledge "borrowed"?
Struck With Amazement (pp. 66 to 70)
"How can this accursed way of life and death be his (any longer) who stands struck with amazement as he observes that nature (Spanda) which presides over all the activities?" Here the text describes the realiser, and Kshemaraja turns the verse into a short manual of practice: the middle state, the cessation of the breaths, and the Bhairava-mudra of open eyes and inward attention.
The Verse
Tam adhisthatrbhavena svabhavam avalokayan / Smayamana ivaste yastasyeyam kusrtih kutah //
Commentary Walkthrough
Carrying samadhi into ordinary life. Kshemaraja's introduction says this verse is about one "who makes even the normal consciousness after trance (vyutthana) similar to samadhi by a firm grip of the Spanda-principle".
The middle state. The yogi "apprehends knowledge and activity as the presiding principle of life as the 'I' pervading the normal consciousness even after meditation has ceased. His middle state (madhya dasa) develops as described in Vijnanabhairava: 'When the middle state develops by means of the dissolution of all dichotomising thought-constructs, the prana sakti in the form of exhalation does not go out from the centre to dvadasanta, nor does that sakti in the form of inhalation enter into the centre from dvadasanta. In this way, by means of Bhairavi who expresses herself in the form of the cessation of prana and apana, one acquires the form of Bhairava.'" (VB 26) Singh's note: dvadasanta is "a distance of twelve fingers from the tip of the nose"; the middle state "is cidananda, consciousness-bliss".
The gold pillar. The Kaksyastotra: "Throwing by will all the powers like seeing, etc. simultaneously on all sides into their respective objects and remaining (unmoved) in the middle like a gold pillar, you (O Siva) alone appear as the form of the entire cosmos."
Bhairava-mudra. By the middle state "which pervades simultaneously both nimilana and unmilana samadhi", he "enters the Bhairavamudra in which all his senses are widely open simultaneously but the attention is turned within": "Attention should be turned inwards; the gaze should be turned outwards, without the twinkling of the eyes. This is the mudra pertaining to Bhairava, kept secret in all the Tantras."
Amazement. "He sees the totality of objects appearing and disappearing in the ether of his consciousness like a series of reflections appearing and disappearing in a mirror. Instantly all his thought-constructs are split asunder by the recognition, after a thousand lives, of his essential nature surpassing common experience and full of unprecedented bliss. He is struck with amazement, as though entering the mudra of amazement." Singh's note: vismaya-mudra, "in which the mouth is wide open, and the tongue lolls out".
No more wandering. "This wandering consisting in the wretched succession of life and death... does not occur in his case, because of the absence of its cause consisting in innate impurity." The Malinivijaya: "One whose mind is fixed on reality, even though enjoying sense-objects, cannot be touched by vice, even as a lotus-leaf cannot be touched by water", and like one protected by a mantra who eats poison without effect.
Singh's Exposition
Singh's exposition is three sentences: the yogi "knows that this is his essential Self, and not the empirical, psychosomatic creature whom he had so long considered to be his Self. He has now broken his shackles and is truly free."
Amazement (vismaya) is a technical term in this tradition, not a figure of speech. The Siva Sutras (I.12) say "the stages of yoga are amazement", and here the realiser stands "as if smiling" or "as if wonderstruck" (smayamana iva). The key is that wonder is not a state of knowing something new; it is the mind stopping before something it cannot classify. That is exactly what dissolves thought-constructs. Bhairava-mudra is a method for producing this: eyes open to the whole field, attention resting in the knower, nothing grasped.
Critical Lens
The lotus-leaf and poison images are classic, and in Tantric hands they carry a specific and potentially dangerous claim: that the realised yogi can enjoy sense objects without moral consequence. In context, the claim is about the absence of the cause of rebirth, not a licence. But the history of guru movements, including movements associated with the teachers who blessed and promoted this book, shows how easily "he cannot be touched by vice" can be used to excuse conduct. A reader should hold the teaching and the safeguard together: the verse describes a result, not a permission, and no one else can certify that you, or a teacher, have reached it.
Key Terms
- Adhisthatr: the presiding principle, the permanent Experient.
- Vyutthana: the state after rising from meditation.
- Madhya dasa: the middle state.
- Dvadasanta: the point twelve finger-widths from the nose (also above the head).
- Bhairava-mudra: open gaze, inward attention.
- Vismaya: amazement, wonder.
Reflection and Practice
- Sit with the eyes open and soft, taking in the whole visual field without focusing on anything. Let attention rest on the one who sees. Stay for two minutes without blinking more than you need to.
- When did you last feel genuine wonder? What happened to your thoughts at that moment?
The Void Is Not the Goal (pp. 70 to 79)
"Mere non-existence cannot be an object of contemplation, nor can it be said there is no stupefaction in that state, because on account of the application of backward reference, it is certain that it (the experience of stupefaction) was there. Hence that artificial object of knowledge is always like sound sleep. It is not in this manner, i.e. as a state of recollection, that the Spanda-principle is known." These two verses are the text's main attack on meditation that ends in void, and Kshemaraja's longest polemic so far. The targets named are the Vedantins, Naiyayikas and Madhyamikas.
The Verses
Nabhavo bhavyatameti na ca tatrasty amudhata / Yato'bhiyoga-samsparsat tadasid iti niscayah //12 Atastatkrtrimam jneyam sausupta-padavat sada / Na tvevam smaryamanatvam tat tattvam pratipadyate //13
Commentary Walkthrough
Non-existence cannot be contemplated. Non-existence, as in the Vedic line "Verily, in the beginning, all this was not", "cannot be an object of contemplation, for contemplation is always of an object that can be existent". If you give it existence, it is no longer non-existence. And "how can that universal extinction be conceived or contemplated where the conceiver himself disappears? If the conceiver is accepted, then universal extinction is an impossible conception."
The Madhyamika position. The contemplator of universal negation "becomes, on the perfection of contemplation, himself non-existent, being identified with his object". Reply: then the state is "not non-insentiency, but rather insentiency or stupefaction". A principle: "whether existent or non-existent, whatever is imagined later, on the perfection of the contemplation, is evidently only a product of imagination."
Nagarjuna's definition. Kshemaraja quotes a definition attributed to Nagarjuna: "That which is devoid of all supports, devoid of all tattvas, devoid of the residual traces of all the klesas, that is Sunya or void. In the highest sense, it is not sunya or void as such." His reply is a conditional concession: "True, if the absolutely free, and ultimate state consisting of Consciousness-bliss be admitted as the substratum." As the Vijnanabhairava says, contemplation of the void should be made "by making the divine, supreme reality of consciousness as the substratum".
The Alokamala. To the claim that the void is "something unknown to people like ourselves", he replies: "if it is unknown... it is impossible to express it. Why call it void? But even void, so long as it is conceived, is verily knowable." And then: "If people like you are unable to realize that state, then you should serve reverentially the real spiritual guide... and not, by using a term like void, according to your own judgement, throw yourself and others, in the unfathomable abyss of immense delusion. Enough of this."
How we know the void was stupor. "Abhiyoga" is the reflection of one who has risen from samadhi: "In what condition was I?" The answer, "I was exceedingly in an insentient state", shows that the state was remembered, and so was an object, "artificial". And remembered experience "only declares the existence of the experient, the knower who had that experience, not non-existence or void."
Objection: how can the void be remembered? Memory is of what was determined, like blue; in the void the buddhi is suppressed. Reply: that is true of the object. But the knower "cannot be separate from himself. Therefore, there is a thought determinative of him only... It is this experiencer of the void who is recollected subsequently in memory as exceedingly limited in opposition to the universe."
The provocation. "The Supreme Lord himself, in order to conceal the real knowledge, shows to the fools void as a reality so that they may accept it as the goal to be achieved."
The summary. "Every one without any effort has the experience of sleep which is like insentiency. Then what is the use of another void which can be acquired only by the effort of meditation? Both are similar in point of unreality. Many philosophers like the Vedantists, the Naiyayikas, the followers of Samkhya and Buddhists and others have fallen into this great uncrossable ocean of immense insentiency in the form of the void." He adds that the void "has proved to be an obstacle even to those who were desirous of entering the Spanda principle when their efforts slackened" (see I.25). "When the defects of the Buddhists have been exposed, the defects of the Vedantists also stand exposed, for their reasoning is similar."
The Spanda principle cannot be remembered. It "is involved uniformly as the Experient in all the experiences." The Brhadaranyaka: "Ah, by what means can one know the knower?" (IV.5.15)
Singh's Exposition
Singh sets out the Madhyamika claim fairly: ultimate reality is a void "in which there is neither knower, nor knowledge, nor known"; the evidence is samadhi, known afterwards by memory. He gives three points against it:
- The experience of void "is mudhata, i.e. insentiency or stupefaction like sleep... a particular state of the manas. It is only a passing phase, not something eternal."
- "Since this experience is a matter of memory... recollection is not possible without a recollector. The Spanda-principle is the recollector, not something recollected." Kallata: to say consciousness "is remembered as insentiency would be contradiction in terms".
- "The main point at issue, however, is not that the Madhyamika maintains that there is an experience of void: that even the follower of Trika philosophy admits, for he believes there is a sunya pramata, the experient of the void. The key point is that the Madhyamika maintains that sunya or void is the characteristic of Reality, that there is no such thing even as a pramata."
He ends with Sankara ("The denier simply affirms the existence of Atma") and a fine line of his own: "The Experient never takes a holiday, for without Him, no experience is possible."
Critical Lens
This is the clearest case in the book of sectarian polemic presented as argument, and it deserves careful reading on both sides.
On the side of the text: the point that any experience, including an experience of blankness, implies an experiencer, and that a blank meditative state remembered afterwards is a state, not the ground of all states, is a genuine and useful warning for meditators. Many contemplative traditions, including Buddhist ones, warn against mistaking a blank absorption for liberation.
On the other side: Madhyamaka does not teach that reality is "universal extinction" or that one should meditate on non-existence. Nagarjuna's emptiness (sunyata) means that things lack independent, self-standing existence; Nagarjuna explicitly warns against taking emptiness as a view, and against nihilism. The quoted definition, which ends "in the highest sense, it is not void as such", shows this, and Kshemaraja's reply concedes it on condition that the void be given a consciousness-substratum, which is exactly the point a Madhyamika would reject. Lumping Vedantins, Naiyayikas, Samkhyas and Buddhists together as having "fallen into" the void is rhetorical; their positions are very different. The line that God shows the void to fools in order to conceal the truth is not an argument at all. And the remedy, "serve reverentially the real spiritual guide", replaces the question of who is right with the question of whose guru to trust.
Singh's own Exposition is more careful than Kshemaraja, especially his third point, which locates the real disagreement precisely.
Key Terms
- Abhava / sunya: absence / void.
- Mudhata: stupefaction, insentiency.
- Abhiyoga: backward reference, reflection on a past state.
- Sunya pramata: the experient of the void, one of the grades of experient in Trika.
- Smaryamana: being remembered.
Reflection
- If you meditate, recall the "blankest" period you have had. Was there anything that knew it was blank, then or afterwards?
- Is "I was in a blank state" a memory of the state or of the one who was in it?
Only the Object Perishes (pp. 79 to 85)
"Of this Spanda principle, two states are spoken about, viz., of the doer or the subject and the deed or the object. Of these two, the deed or the object is subject to decay but the doer or the subject is imperishable. In the samadhi of void, only the effort which is directed towards objectivity disappears. It is only a fool who, on the disappearance of that effort, thinks 'I have ceased to be'. There can never be the disappearance of that inner nature which is the abode of the attribute of omniscience in the event of the non-perception of anything objective." The three verses complete the argument against the void and give the system's theory of causality.
The Verses
Avasthayugalam catra karyakartrtva-sabditam / Karyata ksayini tatra kartrtvam punaraksayam //14 Karyonmukhah prayatno yah kevalam so'tra lupyate / Tasmin lupte vilupto'smityabudhah pratipadyate //15 Na tu yo'antarmukho bhavah sarvajnatva-gunaspadam / Tasya lopah kadacitsyad anyasyanupalambhanat //16
The Objection
The objector turns verse 2 against the author: you said the universe rests in consciousness and comes forth from it, so "consciousness itself assumes the form of universal objectivity", and so has "by relinquishing its nature, assumed an artificial form of negation or void". How then is it "uninterrupted bliss and never insentient"?
Commentary Walkthrough
Two states only in words. "Spoken of as the doer and the deed implies that the two states are differentiated only by the use of words, i.e. only in speech. In reality, the two states are but one, viz. the principle of Siva who is absolutely free and mass of light."
Causality is agency. The Isvarapratyabhijna: "It is not in the power of the insentient (e.g. the seed) to bring forth anything into existence (e.g. the sprout)... Therefore, the causal relation is really the relation between the doer or creator and the deed." Singh's note: "Karya-karana-bhava or causality in this system actually means the kartr-karmatva-bhava... for in the final analysis, all the so-called causes derive their power from the Ultimate Agent."
How the creator creates. "By the process of uniting and separating various manifestations such as space, time, etc. he manifests innumerable things like body, blue, etc. which, though non-different from the essential nature of consciousness appear as different like reflections in a mirror."
What perishing means. "Its perishableness is, however, nothing else than its submergence of thisness (objectivity) and abiding as the I." So "it is only the objective aspect of the subject such as the body, etc. which is manifested and withdrawn by the Lord, not the Subjective aspect which is identical with the light of the Supreme I."
Verses 15 and 16. In meditation on the void and in deep sleep, "only the effort consisting in directing the senses, etc. towards the objects disappears. On its disappearance, only a fool, whose sense of Self is eclipsed owing to meditation on the void, thinks 'I have ceased to be'." But "no one can be found as the perceiver of the cessation of that inward nature. If any such person is found, it is just he who is the inner consciousness (that was supposed to have ceased). If no such person is found, how then can it be decided that there was ever such a state of cessation?"
The jar analogy: one might say "just as the absence of jar is ascertained from the observation of the ground without the jar, even so the absence of Self may be ascertained". But "the existence of the perceiver of the absence of Self is unavoidable in this case."
"Antarmukha", "inward-facing", is read with wordplay: "Antah = perfect I-ness, and mukham = chief", so the phrase means the spanda principle whose chief characteristic is perfect I-ness. Ramakantha's gloss is simpler: "The Self has two main powers, viz. of knowledge and activity. When during deep sleep, etc., the activity of the inner and outer senses ceases, only the knowledge aspect which is turned towards the Self is prominent."
Singh's Exposition
Two arguments: the object decays, the subject does not; and in void-meditation "it is only the effort towards external objectivity that has ceased to be... That does not prove that the subject also has ceased to be." Ramakantha: "to conclude, on account of the cessation of the activities of the instruments (inner and outer) that there is the cessation of the Self is sheer delusion."
Verse 15 contains one of the most precise observations in the book: what stops in deep absorption is the effort directed towards objects (karyonmukha prayatna). That effort is so habitual that we take it to be ourselves; when it stops, it feels as if "I" have stopped. The verse invites you to notice the difference between the effort of attending outward and the one who attends. This is a phenomenological claim you can test, quite apart from the metaphysics around it.
Critical Lens
The argument "no one can perceive the cessation of the Self, so it never ceases" has the same structure as the earlier arguments from experience: it shows that no experience of the Self's absence is possible, which is true almost by definition. It does not show that the Self exists eternally in the absence of all experience; that is a further step. The move "perishing is just the object's returning to the I" also defines the problem away: if everything that ends just "abides as the I", then nothing could count as a real ending. The system is internally consistent here, but its consistency comes from its starting point.
Key Terms
- Karya / kartr: deed, product / doer, agent.
- Ksayin / aksaya: perishable / imperishable.
- Karyonmukha prayatna: effort directed towards the object.
- Antarmukha bhava: the inward-facing nature.
Reflection
- Before sleep tonight, notice the moment when the effort of attending to the room lets go. Is that the same as you letting go?
- What would it take, in principle, for you to experience your own absence?
The Fully and the Partly Awake (pp. 85 to 89)
"The fully enlightened has, always and incessantly, the undeviating knowledge of the Self in all the three states; the other one (the partially enlightened) has it only at the beginning and end of each state." Having dismissed the unenlightened, who think the Self ends in sleep, the text now grades the enlightened. This verse also sets the agenda for the rest of Section I: from here on, says Kshemaraja, the book is about turning the partly awake into the fully awake.
The Verse
Tasyopalabdhih satatam tripadavyabhicarini / Nityam syat suprabuddhasya tadadyante parasya tu //
Commentary Walkthrough
"Upalabdhi" means "uninterrupted knowledge". The fully enlightened (suprabuddha) is "one who is completely free from even the residual traces of unenlightenment"; "nityam" means "at the beginning, in the middle, and at the end". "The fully enlightened is one whose inner nature always shines as identical with Siva."
The partly awake has awareness "only at the beginning or at the end of each state": "'at the beginning' means 'just when that state is about to start'; 'at the end' means 'at its cessation when the perceiver's mind is withdrawn within.'" He lacks it "in the middle of each of these states which is characterised by specific knowledge appropriate to itself". Somananda's Sivadrsti supports this: "The awareness of Sivata... is observed at the beginning of all knowledge, or it is observed at the end because of the cessation of that knowledge."
Singh's note on the "specific knowledge" of each state: in waking, "the knowledge of each object... which is common to all people"; in dream, knowledge "specific or particular only to the particular dreamer"; in deep sleep, "only the residual traces (samskara)".
A rare acknowledgement and a jab. Kshemaraja cites Bhatta Lollata's lost gloss in his support, and then adds: "We have not been taught to give far-fetched explanation of the clear meaning of these karikas in accordance with the wording of the gloss of Bhatta Sri Kallata." He thus quietly disagrees with Kallata, the oldest commentator, while claiming the verse is "clear".
The instruction. "For the purpose of enlightening fully the partially enlightened yogi, the instruction is given to fill even the middle state consisting of the determination of objects, with the rapturous experience of the fourth state, just as he fills with that bliss the initial and the final phases." The Siva Sutras say the same: "The fourth state of Atmic consciousness should be poured like (uninterrupted flow of) oil in the three states" (III.20).
Singh's Exposition
Singh gives three categories:
| Type | Description |
|---|---|
| Aprabuddha, unawakened | "completely ignorant of spiritual Reality... has absolutely no interest in yoga and is not yet qualified to appreciate its teaching" |
| Prabuddha, partially enlightened | aware of spanda "in the beginning and end of waking, dreaming and profound sleep but not in the middle"; "the fit candidate for yoga, and the teachings are given for his improvement" |
| Suprabuddha, fully enlightened | "an uninterrupted awareness of it in all the three states"; "needs no teaching of yoga"; "has, in the evolutionary scheme, already attained the highest experience that is open to man" |
Singh notes a terminological wobble: the prabuddha is also called aprabuddha "in comparison to suprabuddha", and the suprabuddha is "sometimes referred to simply as prabuddha". Read the terms by context.
The junctions between states are the practical key. The moment of falling asleep, the moment of waking, the gap at the end of one perception before the next: these are where the partly awake already glimpse the Self, because the "specific knowledge" of the state has not yet taken over or has just let go. The practice is to notice these seams and then to widen them until they cover the middle. This is the same teaching as the Vijnanabhairava's many "gap" practices, and it is one of the most usable ideas in the book.
Critical Lens
The scale of three types is clear, but note what it implies for verification. The suprabuddha "needs no teaching of yoga" and has awareness even in deep sleep, an inner state no one else can observe. A tradition that grades people by unverifiable inner states will tend to grade them by the authority of their teacher instead. Note also Kshemaraja's posture towards Kallata: he cites the older commentator as "revered" yet treats his reading as far-fetched. His own reading is plausible; the reader should simply notice that "the clear meaning" is the phrase every commentator uses for his own view.
Key Terms
- Upalabdhi: perception, awareness.
- Suprabuddha / prabuddha / aprabuddha: fully awake / partly awake / unawake.
- Turya: the fourth state, the awareness underlying waking, dream and sleep.
- Adi / anta: beginning / end (of a state).
Reflection and Practice
- Tonight, try to notice the last moment before sleep. Tomorrow, notice the first moment of waking, before the day's thoughts arrive.
- During the day, notice the small gap after one sentence you hear ends and before you start interpreting it.
How the Awakened Sees the Three States (pp. 89 to 92)
"The all-pervading lord, possessed of the supreme power in the form of knowledge and knowable, appears in the two states of waking and dream as knowledge and objects of knowledge, and in the other than these two only as consciousness." This verse describes what the fully awake actually experience in each state.
The Verse
Jnanajneya-svarupinya Saktya paramaya yutah / Padadvaye vibhurbhati tadanyatra tu cinmayah //
Commentary Walkthrough
In waking and dream, Sankara "appears predominantly to the fully enlightened... in the form of knowledge and knowable in the middle of these two states and in his own essential form of Spanda principle at the initial and final stages." In the middle of these states, "he sees the universe, like Sadasiva and Isvara, as his own body." In deep sleep, the principle "appears to him only as consciousness on account of the cessation of the entire gamut of objects."
A dispute about the "other". "'In the other than these two' refers only to sound sleep, not to both sound sleep and the fourth state, as others have interpreted, because the previously mentioned phrase 'unfailing in the three states' makes the fourth state irrelevant, and also because the realization of that (spanda principle) is itself the fourth state."
Not about ordinary people. The verse "relates only to the fully enlightened yogi". Applied to ordinary people it would be inconsistent, "because the deep sleep of the common folk is only of the nature of stupefaction".
Another jab. "Henceforward up to the end of the first section, the book has to do only with the perfect enlightenment of the partially enlightened. Other commentators have not understood this fact. Readers may examine this for themselves. How far can I go on pointing this out with regard to every word?"
Singh's Exposition
"This verse is important inasmuch as it throws brilliant light on the realization of the fully enlightened yogi." For him, "the knowledge and the objects of knowledge do not appear as completely external from him but as his own body, fully integrated to his I-consciousness, just as they appear to Sadasiva and Isvara."
"Like Sadasiva and Isvara" refers to the top of the 36-tattva ladder. At Sadasiva, the universe is felt as "I am this" with the emphasis on I; at Isvara, "this is I" with the emphasis on this. The fully awake person is said to live at that level while still in ordinary waking and dream: the world is still there, but experienced as one's own body rather than as something outside. This is the positive picture that the attacks on the "void" were defending: not the disappearance of the world but its re-owning.
Critical Lens
Kshemaraja's complaint about other commentators who misunderstand "every word" is a recurring tone in this book. It tells you something about the commentary's genre: it is not only exposition but a claim to own the text against Kallata, Ramakantha and Utpala Bhatta. Singh's excellent practice of quoting those rivals in his Exposition gives the reader a way to check, and you will often find their readings defensible.
Key Terms
- Jnana / jneya: knowledge / knowable.
- Padadvaya: the two states, waking and dream.
- Cinmaya: made of consciousness.
Reflection
- Can you feel, even briefly, the room you are in as part of your own body rather than as outside you?
- What is different about that, compared with ordinary seeing?
The Gunas Are No Obstacle to the Knower (pp. 92 to 95)
"The particular emanations of Spanda which begin with the gunas and which acquire their existence by having recourse to generic Spanda can never stand in the way of the one who has realized his essential nature." The waking and dream states are full of particulars. Why do they not obscure the fully awake? Because they are forms of spanda itself.
The Verse
Gunadispandanisyandah samanyaspandasamsrayat / Labdhatmalabhah satatam syur jnasyaparipanthinah //
Commentary Walkthrough
Two kinds of spanda. This verse introduces the important distinction between samanya spanda, generic or universal pulsation, and visesa spanda, the particular pulsations: the gunas, the tattvas "from kala down to earth", bodies, senses, worlds and experiences "like blue, pleasure etc., or in the case of yogis... bindu (light) and nada (sound)". These particulars "can never veil his essential nature" because they "acquire their own existence by resorting to the aforesaid generic spanda", "they are born out of and are identical with Spanda".
A ritual image. Kshemaraja quotes the Svacchanda-tantra on the "pillow of Maya" used in ritual: its lower cover red (rajas), its upper cover white (sattva), the pillow itself black (tamas).
Gunas as contracted divine powers. The Isvarapratyabhijna: "Those powers which are jnana, kriya, and maya as the third in the case of the Lord... appear in the case of the limited, empirical individual as sattva, rajas and tamas." The fully enlightened yogi "never puts himself in opposition to the particular Spanda-forms such as the gunas, etc. and only feels himself immersed in the generic Spanda-principle."
Singh's note points out an inconsistency between Kshemaraja's works: here jnana is the predominant sakti of Sadasiva, kriya of Isvara and maya of Suddha Vidya; "In Pratyabhijnahrdayam, Ksemaraja has mentioned iccha as the predominant sakti of Sadasiva, jnana of Isvara and kriya of Suddha Vidya."
Singh's Exposition
"Samanya is the general principle or power of cit or Consciousness; Visesa is the manifestation of Spanda in particular constitutive aspects... Ordinary people considering these particular manifestations of Spanda as something entirely different from Consciousness get entangled in them, but the fully enlightened yogi... considering them only as forms of Spanda... is not befuddled."
Notice the striking inclusion of bindu and nada, inner lights and sounds, among the particulars. These are exactly the experiences many meditators take as signs of progress. The text puts them on the same level as the gunas and the objects of the senses: particular pulsations, harmless to the knower, binding to whoever takes them for the goal. The next verse will say so explicitly.
Critical Lens
Mapping the Samkhya gunas onto contracted forms of Siva's powers is a characteristic Trika move: it absorbs a rival system's categories by placing them lower on its own ladder. It is a coherent strategy, but it is a reinterpretation; for Samkhya, the gunas belong to prakrti, which is fully real and distinct from consciousness. Singh's note on the inconsistency between this text and the Pratyabhijnahrdayam is a good example of his scholarly honesty.
Key Terms
- Samanya spanda / visesa spanda: generic / particular pulsation.
- Guna: sattva (harmony), rajas (motion), tamas (inertia).
- Bindu / nada: inner light / inner sound.
- Aparipanthin: not an obstacle.
Reflection
- Pick a mood you are in right now. Can you see it as a particular wave of a more general aliveness?
- If you have had inner lights or sounds in meditation, what did you make of them?
The Same Powers Bind the Unawake (pp. 95 to 99)
"These (the gunas etc.), however, intent on veiling their real nature push the people of unawakened intellect into the terrible ocean of transmigratory existence from which it is difficult to pull them out." The same particular pulsations that are harmless to the knower bind the unawake. Kshemaraja uses the verse to introduce the four circles of goddesses, Khecari, Gocari, Dikcari and Bhucari, one of the most distinctive teachings of the Spanda school.
The Verse
Aprabuddhadhiyas tvete svasthitisthaganodyatah / Patayanti duruttare ghore samsara-vartmani //
Commentary Walkthrough
Who is unawake? "All those worldly people who have not recognised their spanda principle... and who consider their bodies as the Self, and also all those partially awakened yogis who consider prana, etc. as their Self."
Three kinds of sakti. The Malinivijaya: "The non-supreme ones (aparah) are called ghoratari saktis who while they embrace the Rudra souls, push down and down those jivas who cling to objects of sense." Singh's note lists all three: ghoratari (apara), which help the unattached and push down the attached; ghora (parapara), which bind to the fruits of karma; and aghora (para), "who lead to the state of Siva".
Vamesvari. The supreme power "is called Vamesvari sakti because she manifests both internally and externally and because she has to do with the contrary course of the world". Singh's note gives two meanings of vama: "left, reverse, contrary", because she governs samsara full of difference, and "beautiful", because "she manifests the world which is beautiful expression of Siva".
The four circles. By her are brought into being four groups of divinities "who lead the fully awake soul to the highest stage, but drive the unawakened ones to lower and lower paths":
| Circle | Sphere | For the awake | For the unawake |
|---|---|---|---|
| Khecari ("moving in the ether") | the experient | non-difference, omnipotence, omniscience, perfection, all-pervasiveness | the five kancukas: limited time, efficacy, knowledge, attachment, niyati; they keep him "in the stage of the experient of the void" |
| Gocari (go = speech) | the psychic apparatus: buddhi, ahamkara, manas | determination, ego-sense and ideation of non-difference | determination etc. "only of difference" |
| Dikcari (moving in space) | the ten external senses | manifestation of non-duality | causes of duality |
| Bhucari (bhu = ground) | objects: the pentad of form etc. | reveal themselves "in the form of the light of consciousness" | appear "in the form of limitedness all round" |
These four "throw the worldly people of unenlightened intellect and the partially enlightened yogis who are satisfied only with the experience of light (bindu) and sound (nada) into the world".
Singh's Exposition
"There are various Saktis (powers) who preside as divinities over the particular forms of Spanda. They push down those who deny any divine origin of life and obstinately cling to sensuous pleasure, while they help those in their spiritual journey in whom a higher sense of values has dawned." And: "They always think of their Self as something material and not as pure Consciousness. So material existence is their proper place."
The four circles are a map of where you are caught: as experient (in the sense of being a limited self in time), in the mind (in words and concepts, since "go" is speech), in the senses, or in objects. The same power works at each level; what differs is whether it is recognised. The teaching that a whole circle of goddesses governs the mind's use of language is worth pausing on: the tradition sees verbal thought, not the world, as the main engine of bondage. The Pratyabhijnahrdayam (sutra 12) gives the same four circles; readers of No. 346 will recognise them.
Critical Lens
Singh's Exposition here is the least careful in Section I. The text says the powers bind those who take the body or prana as Self. Singh turns this into a moral sorting: they "push down those who deny any divine origin of life and obstinately cling to sensuous pleasure", and "material existence is their proper place". That reads as a judgement on materialists and unbelievers that goes beyond the verse, which describes a mechanism of misidentification, not a punishment. Note too that the binding powers also catch partly awakened yogis attached to light and sound, which cuts against any neat division of the world into believers and deniers.
Key Terms
- Aprabuddhadhi: one of unawakened intellect.
- Ghoratari, ghora, aghora: the three grades of sakti.
- Vamesvari: the goddess of the "reverse" or "beautiful" course.
- Khecari, Gocari, Dikcari, Bhucari: the four circles of powers.
Reflection
- Which of the four circles catches you most often: the sense of being a limited self, words in the head, the senses, or objects?
- What would it mean for the same power to bind and free?
Always on the Alert (pp. 99 to 100)
"Therefore, one should be always on the alert for the discernment of the Spanda principle. Such a person attains his essential state (as spanda) even in the waking condition in short time." The section's central instruction is a single word: udyukta, always on the alert, intent, engaged.
The Verse
Atah satatam udyuktah spanda-tattva-viviktaye / Jagradeva nijam bhavam acirenadhigacchati //
Commentary Walkthrough
He who is always alert "attains, in short time, his essential nature which is the same as Sankara even in the state of waking, if, as has been said in the Gita, 'Those who merging their mind in me, always united with me, wait upon me' (XII.2), he is always intent on the close observation of the inner nature." Then "his inner nature, which is Sankara, itself emerges before him", he "becomes fully enlightened (suprabuddha), and becomes liberated while living."
Singh's notes: "even in the waking condition" means "not only in the state of meditation but also when he is actively engaged in the hum-drum routine of life"; and "always intent" means "the constant awareness of the divine".
Singh's Exposition
"The mind of those who have constant awareness of the Divine is transformed by the mysterious alchemic force present within and thus they acquire Integral Divine Consciousness." Utpala Bhatta gives the form of the discernment: "I am only pure Consciousness: this world is only a glorious manifestation of myself."
Two things make this verse distinctive. The first is the stress on waking: liberation is not reserved for meditation or for death, it is attained "in the waking condition" and "in short time". The second is Utpala Bhatta's formula, which gives a practical shape to the alertness: not a technique but a recognition held continuously, "I am consciousness; this is my expression". The Gita quotation shows that Kshemaraja happily uses devotional language for this.
Critical Lens
"Integral Divine Consciousness" is Sri Aurobindo's vocabulary, not Kshemaraja's; Singh uses it again here. "In short time" (acirena) is a promise every path makes; the text gives no measure. Read the verse as a description of a sustained practice, not a guarantee.
Key Terms
- Udyukta: alert, intent, engaged.
- Vivikti: discernment, distinguishing.
- Jivanmukti: liberation while living.
Practice
- Choose a recurring cue in your day (opening a door, a phone notification). Each time, briefly recall Utpala Bhatta's formula.
- At the end of the day, note how many times you remembered.
Anger, Joy, Impasse and Flight (pp. 100 to 104)
"In that state is the Spanda-principle firmly established to which a person is reduced when he is greatly exasperated or overjoyed, or is in impasse reflecting what to do, or is running for life." This is the most famous verse of the Spandakarikas and one of the most original teachings in Indian contemplative literature. Intense states stop the mind by themselves; at that moment, spanda is exposed.
The Verse
Atikruddhah prahrsto va kim karomi iti va mrsan / Dhavan va yatpadam gacchettatra spandah pratisthitah //
Commentary Walkthrough
The principle. "In all the ways of approach to the Divine, the yogis are established in one-pointed concentration after having allayed all the other mental activities. But in these states of vehement anger etc. all the other activities of the mind cease by themselves without any effort on the part of the yogis, and if the yogis who are always on the alert instantly become introverted, they attain their desired object instantaneously. The purport is that those who are not yogis remain only stupefied (in these states)."
Four vivid scenes. Kshemaraja gives each state a scene and a governing goddess:
| State | Scene | Power |
|---|---|---|
| Great anger | seeing "an enemy who has inflicted a terrible wound only a short while before or hearing various heart-rending words of the enemy" | "the goddess 'wishing to destroy'" |
| Great joy | "the sight of the beloved with moon-like face longed for since long, the entire group of the senses stimulated and running after her" | "the goddess of intense longing" |
| Impasse | "encompassed all round by a force of strong desperadoes intent on murder", "all hopes of help being shattered" | mental activity suspended by uncertainty |
| Flight | "attacked by a furious elephant in rut", running "without any regard for his body" | "the goddess of exertion" |
He adds "great fear generated by the sight of a lion or python".
The method. "Considering carefully the cessation of all other mental activities, instantly allaying the states of anger, uncertainty within him, by the device of the tortoise contracting all its limbs within (on the occasion of fear) or by expanding his state of joy, running etc., he should contemplate on the Spanda energy which has manifested itself before him."
Vijnanabhairava parallels. Verse 101: "If one succeeds in immobilizing his mind when he is under the sway of desire, anger, greed, infatuation, arrogance and envy, then the Reality underlying these states alone subsists." Verse 71: on great delight, or seeing a friend after a long time, "one should meditate on the delight itself and become absorbed in it". Verse 118: "At the commencement and end of sneeze, in terror, in sorrow, in the condition of a deep sigh or on the occasion of flight from an elephant, during keen curiosity, at the commencement or end of hunger, the state of brahman approaches near."
Singh's Exposition
"We are unable to grasp the inner Reality because of the whirligig of imagination and thought. It is only when this whirligig stops... that we are in a fit condition to have an experience of Reality... Yogis, mystics practise meditation in order to put a stop to all restless mental activities, but intense emotional experiences, of themselves, bring the squirrel-like activities of the mind to a dead halt. That is the psychological moment for catching the vibration of the inner Reality... This opportunity is not open to all; it is open only to those who are eagerly waiting for its reception."
Ramakantha's qualification is the key: "These emotional states serve, to the awakened one, as a means for realizing the abiding Spanda if they throw him into a reflective recollection of his essential I-consciousness, not if they involve him in their own experience. The experience of these states is only one of pleasure or pain."
The verse inverts the usual spiritual advice. Most traditions treat anger, passion and fear as obstacles to be calmed before meditation can begin. Here they are doorways, because they do in an instant what meditation takes years to do: halt the stream of thought. Three conditions make the doorway work: you must already be alert (udyukta), you must turn inward instantly, and, per Ramakantha, you must not be swept into the emotion's content. Without these, says Kshemaraja bluntly, one simply "remains stupefied". This is the clearest practical teaching in the text, and it can be tried on small scales: a sudden noise, a moment of surprise, the start of irritation.
Critical Lens
This teaching is powerful and easy to misuse. It does not recommend seeking anger, fear or danger, nor does it treat anger as spiritually good; Kshemaraja speaks of "instantly allaying the states of anger". The scenes are also clearly composed for a male, warrior-class or courtly reader (the enemy's wound, the moon-faced beloved, the rutting elephant). Modern readers who try this with strong emotions should be aware that people with trauma can find intense states destabilising rather than opening; the verse assumes a practitioner already grounded in sustained alertness. Start small.
Key Terms
- Atikruddha: greatly enraged.
- Prahrsta: overjoyed.
- Kim karomi: "what shall I do?", the impasse.
- Dhavan: running.
- Kurma-yukti: the tortoise device, withdrawing all the senses.
Practice
- The next time you are startled (a door slams, a phone rings), notice the split second before thought resumes. What is there?
- When you feel the first flare of irritation, before it becomes a story, turn attention to the one who feels it. Note what happens to the irritation.
- When joy arrives (good news, a friend), let it expand rather than talking about it, as Vijnanabhairava 71 suggests.
The Rise Through Susumna and the Great Ether (pp. 104 to 108)
"Taking firm hold of that (spanda) the awakened Yogi remains firm with the resolution 'I will surely carry out whatever it will tell me'. Resting on the experience of that Spanda, both prana (surya) and apana (candra) get merged in the susumna and by the upward path of Susumna they rise up to the great ether of universal consciousness by abandoning the sphere of the body together with the Brahmarandhra and are completely dissolved in it. There the unenlightened by considering that state a kind of deep sleep remains stupefied, while the one who is not covered with the darkness of infatuation is established in that ether of universal consciousness and abides as fully enlightened." Section I closes with its only description of the subtle-body process, and with a final warning.
The Verses
Yam avastham samalambya yadayam mama vaksyati / Tadavasyam karisye'ham iti samkalpya tisthati //23 Tam asrityordhvamargena candrasuryavubhavapi / Sausumne'dhvanyastamito hitva brahmandagocaram //24 Tada tasmin mahavyomni pralinasasibhaskare / Sausupta-padavan mudhah prabuddhah syadanavrtah //25
Commentary Walkthrough
The resolution. "'Ayam' (this) means 'my essential Self which is of the nature of Sankara'. Whatever... my essential Self will tell me, i.e. will admonish, that will I surely carry out, i.e. leaving extroverted attitude I will be devoted to it." The state held is "that spanda state which was previously experienced as consciousness bliss in the state of vehement anger, etc.", so these verses continue I.22. "Tisthati" implies "laying to rest all thought-constructs, he resorts to a state of the absence of thought-constructs firmly".
The ascent. "The surya and candra, i.e. prana and apana meeting in the stage of hrdaya (centre of the body) and being merged together in the channel of Susumna which is otherwise called Brahmanadi, journeying by the upper, i.e. the udana route, get dissolved in the great ether of consciousness, abandoning the sphere of the body presided over by Brahma who specially presides over Brahmarandhra."
The danger of slackness. "The yogi who has even attained to the stage of the great ether of consciousness, if he is slack in his efforts, being deluded by the particular emanations of Spanda such as gunas, etc. in the form of Khecari and other saktis, experiences it like deep sleep, and thus remains stupefied." Kallata: "That unawakened yogi who has not fully realized his essential nature, being deluded by dream etc. is held back."
The close. "He, however, who by the intensity of effort and the force of exertion, does not become slack even for a moment, is called prabuddha, i.e. suprabuddha." "Therefore, the revered teacher has enjoined that the yogi should always make strenuous endeavour. May there be good for all." Thus ends Section I, the Spandanirnaya proper, "dealing with Spanda which is one's essential nature".
Singh's Exposition
Singh's summary is brief: "When the yogi catches hold of the Spanda principle, his prana and apana get merged in Susumna, they mount up by the path of susumna even beyond Brahmarandhra and get dissolved in the great ether of consciousness. At such an occasion, the yogi who is not fully awakened and is not on the alert is simply stupefied, while the yogi who is fully awakened is not covered with infatuation by that wonderful experience."
Two points tie Section I together. First, the ascent is a result, not a technique: nowhere does the verse tell you to push breath into the central channel. It happens "resting on the experience of that spanda" and after the resolution to obey what the Self "tells". Second, the same summit can be wasted: the void-like absorption at the top, if met with slackness, is just another deep sleep. This is the positive form of the polemic of I.12 and 13: the void is real as an experience, but whether it frees depends on whether the knower stays awake in it.
Critical Lens
The subtle-body vocabulary (sun and moon, susumna, brahmarandhra) is shared with the Hatha and Nath traditions that readers of No. 345 met in Gorakhnath. Two cautions. The Spandakarika itself is very sparing with this material; it occurs once, at the end, and Kshemaraja's commentary adds the detail. And the claim that the experience happens "beyond Brahmarandhra" is an inner-experiential map, not anatomy; no physical channel corresponds to susumna. Finally, the resolution "I will carry out whatever it tells me" is beautiful when "it" is one's own awakened nature, and dangerous when that voice is confused with a guru's instructions or with an impulse; the text gives no way to tell them apart, which is why the later tradition places such weight on the teacher.
Key Terms
- Samkalpa: resolution.
- Surya / candra: sun and moon, prana and apana.
- Susumna / Brahmanadi: the central channel.
- Brahmarandhra: the "aperture of Brahman" at the crown.
- Mahavyoman: the great ether, universal consciousness.
- Mudha / anavrta: stupefied / unveiled.
Reflection
- Have you ever reached a deep, quiet state in meditation and then found that you had simply drifted? What would "not slackening" have meant in that moment?
- What, if anything, does your own deepest nature "tell" you? How would you know it was that and not something else?
Section I in Summary
| Verses | Theme |
|---|---|
| 1 | Sankara, the source of the wheel of powers, opens and closes the world |
| 2 | All abides in and comes from him; he is unconcealed |
| 3 to 5 | He is the same through all three states; beyond pleasure, pain, subject and object; he exists, though not as an object |
| 6 to 8 | Examine the power behind the senses; desire is not the driver |
| 9 to 11 | When agitation ceases, innate knowledge and action shine; amazement |
| 12 to 16 | Polemic: the void is stupor; only the object perishes |
| 17 to 21 | Three grades of the awake; the four circles of powers; always be alert |
| 22 to 25 | Strong emotions as doorways; the ascent and the warning against slackness |
The Rise of Innate Knowledge (Sahaja-vidyodaya)
Section I described spanda "which can be recognized by nimilana samadhi", inward absorption with the senses withdrawn. Section II, "consisting of seven verses", describes "the universality of the same spanda principle recognizable by unmilana-samadhi", outward-open absorption, in which the world itself is seen as Siva. Kshemaraja calls it the section on "the rise of innate knowledge" (sahaja-vidya), "which reveals identity with consciousness everywhere".
Kshemaraja's Summary of the Section
"The universe is twofold, pure and impure." Singh's note: the pure universe consists of "Mantra, Mantresvara, Mantra-Mahesvara, Siva, and Sakti"; the impure, "Maya down to Prthvi tattva".
| Verses | Content |
|---|---|
| II.1 and 2 | The pure (mantras and their deities) emanate from spanda, are identical with it and merge in it |
| II.3 and 4 | The impure is "of the same stuff": no state is not Siva |
| II.5 | One established in this is liberated while living |
| II.6 and 7 | By this realization alone, practitioners reach their goal: the true meditation, ambrosia, Self-realization and initiation |
Singh's Exposition at the end of the section states the shift precisely: "In the first section, the emphasis is on the Self-realization or in the technical language of this system on atmavyapti, on the realization of Self as Siva. In the second section, the emphasis is on the realization of the universe as Siva, or... on Siva-vyapti." And: "In the second section, the emphasis is on unmilana samadhi or extroversive meditation in which in spite of the senses being open to the onset of external sensation, the world appears as the materialization of the bliss of Siva. Ksemaraja rightly calls it mahasamapatti, the coup of supreme realization."
This two-step structure (first find the Self within, then find the world as the Self) is the core of the Trika path and the main thing that separates it from teachings that stop at withdrawal. Singh's note at II.7 makes the point sharply: "According to Trika philosophy, 'atma-vyapti' or realization of Self is not the highest ideal. It is Sivavyapti, viz., the realization of both the Self and the universe as Siva." Readers who know Advaita Vedanta should note that this is a deliberate step beyond the witness-consciousness that sees the world as appearance.
Even the Mantras Draw on Spanda (pp. 110 to 114)
"Resorting to that power (of Spanda-tattva), the divinities, Mantra etc. together with the sacred formulae which serve as their indicators, being endowed with the power of omniscience proceed to carry out their assigned functions towards the embodied ones just as the senses of the embodied ones by resorting to the power of Spanda proceed to carry out their functions. Freed of all limitations of office after having performed their assigned duties, their denotation as particular deities having ceased, they get dissolved together with the mind of their devotees in that very Spanda principle. Hence they are of the nature of Siva."
The Verses
Tadakramya balam mantrah sarvajnabalasalinah / Pravartante'dhikaraya karananiva dehinam //1 Tatraiva sampraliyante santarupa niranjanah / Saharadhaka-cittena tenaite sivadharminah //2
Commentary Walkthrough
Two readings of "mantra". Kshemaraja reads "mantras" first as deities: "Anantabhattaraka, Vyomavyapins, etc.", the beings of the pure order who carry out "their assigned functions of manifestation, withdrawal, veiling, grace, etc. in respect of the limited souls". In his second reading they are sacred formulae used by "the acaryas who are occupied with initiation", which "proceed with the mind of the devotees for performing the function of liberation and enjoyment", and then, "after their bodies of articulate sound cease to exist", "rest in that Spanda principle". Singh notes that Ramakantha and Utpala Bhatta "have taken the word mantrah only in the sense of sacred formulae".
The example. Mantras work "as the senses operate in manifesting objects by obtaining the power of that Spanda" (I.6). The same power runs the eye and the mantra.
Grammar of dissolution. "Sam" means "by attaining complete identity", "pra" means "intensely... without ever returning to their previous state". They dissolve "with the knowledge of the people who were devoted to them". Singh's note gives Ramakantha's gloss (the devotee's mind returns to its original state once the purpose is fulfilled) and adds a deeper meaning: "the limited knowledge of the devotee is dissolved; it is now transformed into higher consciousness."
Why are mantras omniscient but senses not? "The Lord forms by His Mayasakti the bodies and the senses which are full of difference. By His Sakti of Suddha Vidya, He forms mantras out of wonderful expressive saktis (vacah) which are of the nature of the ether of consciousness and thus non-different from the Lord." Mantra-words "do not transgress the stage of the experient even at the Mayic stage". Abhinavagupta's gloss of "niranjana" (Singh's note): "those which can never be known as objects... The mantras are full of I-consciousness; therefore they are always as subjects."
The scope of the claim. "In all the ten, eighteen divisions of the Saiva sastras, the Spanda principle has been declared to be the quintessence of the mantras."
Singh's Notes on Saiva Initiation and Scriptures
Singh gives two useful lists. The four initiations: samayika (into the rules of conduct), putraka (the disciple "adopted as the successor of the guru"), sadhaka (into the mysteries of yoga) and acarya (to become a guru). The three schools of Saiva scripture: Siva tantras (ten, teaching duality), Rudra tantras (eighteen, teaching unity in diversity) and Bhairava tantras (sixty-four, teaching non-duality).
The teaching here is that a mantra is not a magic word with its own power. It works because it is a pulse of the same consciousness that you are, formed at a purer level than ordinary speech; and its success is its own dissolution, back into the silence it came from, taking the devotee's mind with it. This makes mantra practice a form of the spanda yoga rather than a separate technique: the moment of a mantra's fading is the moment to notice.
Critical Lens
Singh's list of "ten, eighteen and sixty-four" tantras arranged by duality, unity in diversity and non-duality is the Kashmiri non-dual tradition's own classification, which ranks its own scriptures (the Bhairava tantras) at the top. Modern scholarship on Saiva scripture treats this as a later, partisan hierarchy; the dualist Siddhanta, whose scriptures are the "ten Siva and eighteen Rudra" tantras, would order things the other way. The claim that "all" Saiva sastras declare spanda the essence of mantras is Kshemaraja's.
Key Terms
- Mantra / Mantresvara / Mantramahesvara: the three classes of beings of the pure order.
- Adhikara: office, assigned function.
- Niranjana: unstained, never an object.
- Diksa: initiation (samayika, putraka, sadhaka, acarya).
Reflection
- If you use a mantra or prayer, notice the silence just after it fades. What is there?
- Can you feel the difference between words that come from habit and words that come from presence?
No State Is Not Siva (pp. 114 to 119)
"Since the limited individual Self is identical with the whole universe, inasmuch as all entities arise from him, and because of the knowledge of all subjects, he has the feeling of identity with them all, hence whether in the word, object or thought, there is no state which is not Siva. It is the experient himself who, always and everywhere, abides in the form of the experienced." This is the most quoted line of the Spandakarikas, and the theological centre of Section II.
The Verses
Yasmat sarvamayo jivah sarvabhava-samudbhavat / Tatsamvedanarupena tadatmya-pratipattitah //3 Tasmacchabdarthacintasu na savastha na ya sivah / Bhoktaiva bhogyabhavena sada sarvatra samsthitah //4
Commentary Walkthrough
Everything is Siva. "There is no state whether it is the beginning or the middle or the end and whether it is word, or object, or ideation... which is not Siva. The sense is that every thing is Siva." The experient "abides wholly, i.e. neither less nor more in the form of the experienced, such as the body, blue etc." "The experienced is nothing different from the experient."
From jiva to Siva. "Since this teaching begins with jiva and ends with Siva, it teaches by way of suggestion that there is no essential difference between jiva and Siva, that is to say, one should not regard oneself as imperfect in any state like body, etc."
Two reasons. The jiva is identical with the whole first "because he is the origin or cause of the production of all entities" (a hymn of Jnanagarbha: "Thy sport becomes in this world the cause of the diversity of the knower, knowing, knowledge and the knowable"), and second "because he is identical with the knowledge of the whole in the form of blue, pleasure, etc."
Supporting quotations. Utpaladeva's lost Pratyabhijna-tika: those who perceive "even jar, etc." as Siva and honour it "acquire spiritual perfection". Bhatta Vamana: "As all objects are known only when they rest on Consciousness... all things exist only as known. So one should identify himself with Consciousness."
What these verses contain. Kshemaraja claims the two verses suggest "the secret practices and the teachings of wisdom... which serve to uproot the tree of all differences", and that the opening and closing verses of Section I suggest the mahartha (Singh's note: "refers to the Krama system"), I.3 "the highest truth of the Trika system", and II.1 "the quintessence of all worship". "Therefore, all instructions are acknowledged to be imparted by Spanda principle only."
Singh's Exposition
"Firstly, the individual is identical with total reality. The reason is that through knowledge (samvedana) he knows every thing. Therefore through knowledge he feels his identity with the all-of-reality. As he becomes identified with the whole of Reality, he becomes in the words of Ksemaraja visvasakti, 'universal power'... Secondly, as he feels his identity with all, there is no state which is not Siva to him. Therefore, the difference between the experient and the experienced disappears for him."
The phrase "word, object or thought" (sabda, artha, cinta) is precise. It covers everything you can be aware of: the names in your head, the things in front of you, and the ideas that relate them. To say none of these is "not Siva" is to say there is no part of experience that has to be excluded or escaped. This is what makes the Trika path world-affirming. Practically, it removes the split between "spiritual" and "ordinary" moments; the argument of verse 3, "all things exist only as known", is the bridge.
Critical Lens
The argument of verse 3 moves from an epistemic claim (everything I know exists for me only as known, in my awareness) to a metaphysical one (everything is identical with consciousness, and the jiva "is the cause of the production of all entities"). This is the classical step of idealism, and it is where most critics, Indian and Western, have objected: from "I can know nothing outside awareness" it does not follow that nothing exists outside awareness. Kshemaraja's own Buddhist opponents, the Yogacara idealists, made a similar move and were attacked for it by realists. The Trika answer is that the point is not a theory but a recognition; but then the argument is doing less work than it claims. Notice also Kshemaraja's habit of finding the Krama system "suggested" in verses that do not mention it. Modern scholars see this as his Krama overlay on a text that predates his synthesis.
Key Terms
- Sarvamaya: consisting of everything.
- Samvedana: knowing, awareness.
- Sabda, artha, cinta: word, object, thought.
- Bhoktr / bhogya: experient / experienced.
- Mahartha: "the great meaning", the Krama system.
Practice
- For five minutes, label each experience silently as "word", "object" or "thought". Then, for each, add "and this too".
- Notice an experience you would normally exclude from "spiritual" life (irritation, boredom). Can it be seen as part of the same field?
The Liberated While Living (pp. 119 to 120)
"Or he, who has this realization (identity of his Self with the whole universe), being constantly united with the Divine, views the entire world as the play (of the Self identical with Siva), and is liberated while alive. There is no doubt about this."
The Verse
Iti va yasya samvittih kridatvenakhilam jagat / Sa pasyan satatam yukto jivanmukto na samsayah //
Commentary Walkthrough
The little word "or". "By the use of the word va (or), the author means to suggest that the means of nimilana-samadhi described in the first section is optional, but this realization (of identity with the universe) is essential and difficult to acquire."
Play. Such realization "is attained by some such person as has no future birth. He views the whole world as play and by evolution (unmesa) and involution (nimesa) manifests or withdraws it." "Even while he is exercising the act of maintaining prana, his entire bondage is burnt to ashes by the fire of spiritual knowledge and after the fall of the body, he abides as Siva Himself."
Faith and experience. "By the phrase 'there is no doubt', the author suggests that by initiation, liberation comes about by faith in the guru, but by such knowledge and conduct, it comes about by one's own experience."
Kshemaraja's reading of "or" is a bold claim: the whole inward method of Section I is one option; what is not optional is the recognition of the world as one's own play. This means a person who never achieves the deep withdrawn absorptions of Section I can still be liberated, if the outward-open recognition dawns. The distinction between liberation "by faith in the guru" through initiation and liberation "by one's own experience" is also important; it admits two different kinds of liberation, one of which the person cannot verify for himself.
Critical Lens
"There is no doubt about this" (na samsayah) is a stock phrase of scriptural assertion; it is not an argument. The idea of liberation through initiation that is guaranteed "by faith in the guru" even without personal experience is a doctrine of the ritual Saiva traditions that the non-dual Kashmiri school inherited and kept, while ranking it below direct knowledge. A reader should know that this doctrine is the basis of the guru's power in these traditions.
Key Terms
- Krida: play, sport.
- Jivanmukta: one liberated while living.
- Unmesa / nimesa: opening / closing, manifestation / withdrawal.
Reflection
- Can you see one ordinary situation today as "play" rather than as a problem?
- What would it mean to be liberated without having had any dramatic inner experience?
True Meditation, Ambrosia and Initiation (pp. 120 to 126)
"This only is the manifestation of the object of meditation in the meditator's mind that the aspirant with resolute will has the realization of his identity with that (object of meditation). This alone is the acquisition of ambrosia leading to immortality; this alone is the realization of Self: this alone is the initiation of liberation leading to identity with Siva." Four practices that people pursue, the vision of a deity, the elixir of immortality, Self-realization and initiation, are each redefined as the realization of identity with Siva.
The Verses
Ayamevodayas tasya dhyeyasya dhyayi-cetasi / Tadatmata-samapattir icchatah sadhakasya ya //6 Iyamevamrtapraptir ayamevatmano grahah / Iyam nirvana-diksa ca siva-sadbhavadayini //7
Commentary Walkthrough
1. Meditation. "'One should worship Siva by becoming Siva.'" The "manifestation of the object of meditation" means "identity with Siva, not the perception of some separate form such as the five-headed deity." "Icchatah" means "not simply by determination, but rather by one who is steeped in the will, which is not an idea, of becoming one with Siva". Singh's note: "this realization does not come by way of ideation, but of will." For one whose resolute will is "I am Siva, of compact mass of consciousness and bliss, and the whole universe is my body", what deity will not appear? Utpaladeva: "O Lord, in this whole world which is thy own manifest form, what is that spot which is not a holy place to thy devotees and where the mantras of these devotees will not bear fruit?"
2. Ambrosia. "With any other kind of ambrosia, though it may provide stability to the body for some time, the death of the aspirant is inevitable." The Svacchanda-tantra's chapter on gross ambrosia itself begins: "Never by acquisition of ambrosia can there be victory over death which is brought about by time." The real ambrosia: "Time can never throttle him who always contemplates on Siva."
3. Self-realization. "The Self should be realized" means "the recognition of the Self as Siva who is omniscient, omnipotent and fully free, and not the Self mentioned by the Vedantist in the line, 'All this is verily Purusa'." A sacred text says: "All those votaries of Self do not reach the highest stage."
4. Initiation. "The acarya having a knowledge of this attainment justifies his title of acarya by uniting the Self of the disciple to Siva." The Paratrisika (25): "He who thus knows in reality has his certain initiation which bestows liberation without the oblation with sesamum and ghee." Yet: "Sacerdotal initiation is also initiation. In order that any one may not lose faith in sacerdotal initiation, the chief great teacher has not used the word eva (alone) here."
Utpala Bhatta's etymology. "Diksa is that which gives realization and destroys all impurities... It has the characteristic of both giving (di) and destroying (ksa)."
Singh's Exposition
"The aspirant meditates over mantra in order that the deity embodied in the mantra may manifest himself or herself to him. The author says that the realization on the part of the seeker, of his identity with Siva is alone the manifestation of the deity for which he has been spending days and nights of vigil. Man has been in search of ambrosia that will make him immortal. The author says that the realization of one's identity with Siva is alone the real ambrosia... The aspirant subjects himself to a tedious ceremony of initiation for liberation. The author says that which gives the realization of identity with Siva is alone the real initiation."
Critical Lens
Singh openly corrects Kshemaraja in a note: "By purusa in the above quotation, the Vedantist does not mean the 25th Purusa tattva as Ksemaraja thinks, but Atma, the Divine Consciousness." This is an important admission. Kshemaraja's dismissal of the Vedantic Self rests on reading "Purusa" as the limited individual soul of Samkhya, which is not what the Svetasvatara Upanisad means. The polemic against Vedanta here is, by Singh's own account, partly a misreading.
The comment on initiation is also revealing in a different way. The verse says "this alone is initiation", which would make ritual initiation redundant; Kshemaraja insists that the word "alone" was deliberately omitted from that clause so that people would not lose faith in ritual initiation. Whatever one thinks of this reading, it shows the commentator managing the relation between inner realisation and the institutional ritual that sustained the tradition's teachers. The redefinitions of meditation, ambrosia and initiation are spiritually radical, and they are hedged to protect the institution.
The phrase "worship Siva by becoming Siva" (sivo bhutva sivam yajet) sums up the whole of Section II. It does not reject worship, mantras, initiation or the search for immortality; it relocates each of them. The deity you meditate on "appears" when you recognise yourself in it; immortality is freedom from time, not a long life; initiation is the transmission of this recognition. The test it offers is simple: any practice that leaves you feeling separate from what you worship has not yet arrived.
Key Terms
- Dhyeya / dhyayin: object of meditation / meditator.
- Tadatmata-samapatti: attainment of identity with that.
- Amrta: ambrosia, immortality.
- Nirvana-diksa: initiation for liberation.
- Sivo bhutva sivam yajet: becoming Siva, worship Siva.
Reflection
- If you have a practice of worship or meditation, what would it mean to do it "by becoming" what you worship?
- Kshemaraja protects ritual initiation even while relativising it. What would you lose and gain if all ritual were dropped?
The Supernormal Powers (Vibhuti Spanda)
"Thus by the two sections the absorption into Spanda principle for the manifestation of the state of the fully illuminated yogi has been conclusively explained which is to be brought about by both introversive (nimilana) and extroversive (unmilana) meditation both of which are to be interpenetrative, i.e., the inner experience of the Divine has to be experienced externally also and the external experience of the Divine has to be experienced internally also." Section III, of nineteen verses, describes the vibhutis, "the higher and the lower supernormal powers [that] arise by laying hold of the Spanda principle", and then "the nature of bondage and liberation".
Kshemaraja's Map of Section III
| Verses | Content |
|---|---|
| III.1 to 3 | Freedom in dream on the analogy of freedom in waking; the danger of losing it |
| III.4 and 5 | Knowledge of the desired object |
| III.6 | Power of action; control of hunger |
| III.7 | Omniscience |
| III.8 | Disappearance of depression |
| III.9 | The nature of unmesa |
| III.10 | Rejection of powers that obstruct meditation |
| III.11 | Identity with the whole universe |
| III.12 | The means for that absorption |
| III.13 to 15 | The bondage of the limited individual |
| III.16 | Spanda prevails in both bondage and liberation |
| III.17 and 18 | Bondage restated so that it may be destroyed |
| III.19 | The means of cutting the bond, closing with the theme of I.1 |
Notice how the powers are framed: they come between a section on the highest realisation and a section on bondage and liberation, and the list contains its own warning (III.10). The Spandakarika is unusual in giving powers a place in the theory (they are the natural consequence of contact with spanda) while explicitly subordinating them. Kshemaraja's commentary, as you will see, takes the powers more literally and more practically than the verses strictly require.
Freedom in Dream (pp. 129 to 134)
"As the sustainer of this universe (Siva) when eagerly entreated with desire accomplishes all the desires abiding in the heart of the embodied yogi who is awake after causing the rise of the moon and the sun, so also in dream, by appearing in the central nadi, does He surely reveal always and more vividly his desired objects to him who never desists from his zealous prayer." And (III.3): "Otherwise, the Creative power of the Divine... is free in manifesting always all kinds of things... both in waking and dream states as in the case of the common people of the world."
The Verses
Yathecchabhyarthito dhata jagrato'rthan hrdi sthitan / Somasuryodayam krtva sampadayati dehinah //1 Tatha svapne'pyabhistarthan pranayasyanatikramat / Nityam sphutataram madhye sthito'vasyam prakasayet //2 Anyatha tu svatantra syat srstis taddharmakatvatah / Satatam laukikasyeva jagratsvapnapadadvaye //3
Commentary Walkthrough
Purpose. I.17 to 25 urged the partly awake to tear the veil of dream and deep sleep. Now, "in order to prove the perfect enlightenment of the yogi by his power to rend asunder the condition of ordinary dream and deep sleep, the author is going to show his supernormal power in relation to dream."
The waking powers. "Icchabhyarthitah" means "pleased on account of his discernment of the inner nature". The objects "abiding in the heart of the yogi" are, for example: "the yogi produces agitation (ksobha) of the mind in others, the scattering of other's knowledge hither and thither, immobilising another's knowledge (bodhastobha), and transmission of knowledge into another (jnanasancara) etc." These come about "by causing the rise of the moon and the sun, i.e. of jnanasakti... and kriyasakti": "All that is thought about by the cognitive power is actualized by the operative power."
Symbols at four levels. Singh's notes show how the same symbols shift meaning with the level of practice:
| Symbol | Anava upaya | Sakta upaya | Sambhava upaya | Anupaya |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bindu / nada | prana / apana | means of knowledge / object | jnana / kriya | prakasa / vimarsa |
| Soma / surya (moon / sun) | apana (inhalation) / prana (exhalation) | jnana / kriya | vimarsa / prakasa | (not given) |
Dream practice. Kshemaraja quotes a traditional verse: "When sleep has not yet fully appeared... and all the external objects have faded out of sight, then the state (between sleep and waking) is one on which one should concentrate. In that state, the Supreme Goddess will reveal Herself." And Vijnanabhairava 55: "If pranasakti which is gross and thick... is made frail and subtle, and if a yogi meditates on such sakti in dvadasanta, then by entering mentally in between waking and dream condition, he gains freedom of having dream experiences, i.e., the dream is entirely under his control. He will have only that dream which he wants to experience." Singh's note: the "inner dvadasanta" has three stages: the heart, the hollow below the throat, the point between the eyebrows.
The Lord "appears in the region of the Susumna" of the yogi who is "enjoying the sleep in which yoga is being carried on (Yoganidra)", and "reveals the objects desired such as anava, sakta, or sambhava samavesa (absorption) or other desired objects". "This yogi never suffers from infatuation in dream and deep sleep." The double meaning of "jagratah": "one who is in the waking state and one who is alert about the highest principle".
Verse 3. If the yogi does not keep up the practice, the creative power "is quite free to show always to yogi also similar things both in the waking and dream states, as in the case of the common people... this throws the yogi also into the pit of transmigratory existence like the common people."
Singh's Exposition
"The yogi by his prayerful attitude towards the Divine which really means by being established in his divine nature sees both in the waking and dream states what he wills to see. This is not possible for the common people... But if the yogi becomes unmindful and trips, he becomes subject to the same conditions."
The practice embedded here, keeping awareness at the threshold of sleep until the transition itself becomes conscious, is the same practice modern lucid-dream research calls "wake-initiated" lucidity, and the claim that the dream comes under one's control is not fantastic in that light. What the text adds is the purpose: dream control is a test of the continuity of awareness that I.17 described, not a goal. Note also Singh's quiet reframing of "prayer" as "being established in his divine nature", which removes the sense of petitioning an external god.
Critical Lens
The list of waking "powers" deserves plain description: agitating others' minds, scattering or immobilising their knowledge, and transmitting knowledge into them. These are powers over other people, of the kind found in Tantric manuals of the era, and they sit oddly beside the verse's spiritual framing. Singh passes over them without comment. Modern readers should register two things: no evidence is given that such powers exist, and the tradition itself (in III.10 below) regards seeking powers as an obstacle. Where teachers claim the power of "transmission" (jnanasancara, or shaktipat), as did Swami Muktananda whose foreword opens this book, this passage is part of the doctrinal background. The reader is free to treat the passage as historical evidence of what was claimed, not as a promise.
Key Terms
- Dhatr: the sustainer, Siva.
- Soma / surya: moon / sun; see table.
- Yoganidra: yogic sleep.
- Jnanasancara: transmission of knowledge into another.
- Samavesa (anava, sakta, sambhava): absorption through the three means.
Practice
- As you fall asleep tonight, keep a light awareness on the breath, and notice the moment images begin. Try to remain the witness of the transition for a few breaths.
- In the morning, note whether you remember any moment of awareness during the night.
Seeing More Clearly (pp. 134 to 136)
"Indeed just as a thing which, in spite of all the attentiveness of the mind, is perceived indistinctly at first, appears more distinctly, later, when observed with the strenuous exercise of one's power, so when the yogi resorts to the power (of Spanda), then whatever thing actually exists in whichever form, in whichever place or time, in whichever state, that thing becomes at once manifest in that very way."
The Verses
Yatha hy artho'sphuto drstah savadhane'pi cetasi / Bhuyah sphutataro bhati svabalodyogabhavitah //4 Tatha yatparamarthena yena yatra yatha sthitam / Tattatha balam akramya na cirat sampravartate //5
Commentary Walkthrough
The analogy. A thing seen indistinctly "on account of the drawback of distance, etc." becomes clearer "when observed again minutely with the full application of one's visual power".
Kshemaraja's first reading. The "thing" is spanda itself: "whatever power of spanda principle exists in its highest form in the nature of a mass of consciousness-bliss, in one's own essential nature which is identical with Siva, in a nondifferent way, that appears instantly more distinctly... when observed with the strenuous practice of identity with that inner nature", "by the votary merging his so-called stage of the experient in the form of the psycho-somatic organism in his inner essential Self".
His second reading. To the yogi who stimulates his experient-state "over and over again to the pitch of the highest", "whatever he desires to know, for instance, treasure wherever, i.e. in whichever region, in whichever state, e.g. in the state of actual gold, in whichever form, that at once appears."
The two readings show the range of the whole section. In the first, the verses describe contemplative clarity: the Self, at first seen dimly, becomes vivid with sustained attention, as an object at a distance does. In the second, they describe clairvoyance: finding buried gold. Kshemaraja gives both without choosing. The first is the one a modern practitioner can test; the analogy of the eye's effort is apt, and anyone who has meditated knows the moment when something faint becomes distinct.
Critical Lens
"Treasure... in the state of actual gold" is a striking example for a text that will warn against powers six verses later. It reflects the real world of medieval Tantric practitioners, many of whom were sought out for exactly such services. Treat it as a window into history.
Key Terms
- Asphuta / sphutatara: indistinct / more distinct.
- Svabalodyoga: strenuous use of one's own power.
Practice
Sit and attend to the sense of simply being aware. At first it will be faint. Keep returning to it, gently but persistently, for ten minutes. Does it become more distinct, as the verse says?
Strength for the Weak, Freedom From Hunger (pp. 136 to 138)
"Just as a feeble person also by resorting to that power (of Spanda) succeeds in doing what has to be done, even so one who is exceedingly hungry overcomes his hunger."
The Verse
Durbalo'pi tadakramya yatah karye pravartate / Acchadayed bubhuksam ca tatha yo'ti bubhuksitah //
Commentary Walkthrough
One "who is as emaciated as an abstemious sage, also by resorting to the power of Spanda, i.e. by absorption into spanda and by stimulating his state of the experient of prana, succeeds in doing that which has necessarily to be done, i.e. by resorting to that power he does that which was beyond his power to do. So even he who is excessively hungry overcomes hunger, thirst etc."
The reason: "For one who has entered the state of the mass of spiritual consciousness, there can be no subjection to the pairs of opposites (like heat, cold, etc.), for the pairs of opposites function only in the stage of prana, and this in the case of the yogi gets merged in the stage of the spiritual consciousness."
Utpala Bhatta reads "hunger" broadly as the six waves of existence: "hunger and thirst (of prana), sorrow and delusion (of mind), old age and death (of body)."
The everyday version of this verse is familiar: people in emergencies lift what they could not lift, and people absorbed in work forget to eat. The text's explanation is that hunger and fatigue belong to the level of prana, and attention resting deeper than prana is not subject to them. This is the same principle as I.22 applied to the body. Utpala Bhatta's "six waves" make the verse a statement about all bodily and mental afflictions.
Critical Lens
The claim is about overcoming hunger, not abolishing the need for food. Any reader tempted to test it by fasting should remember that the bodies of "abstemious sages" still die without food, and that the tradition's own image is of strength found in need, not of permanent independence from nourishment.
Key Terms
- Durbala: weak.
- Bubhuksa: hunger.
- Dvandva: the pairs of opposites.
- Sad-urmi: the six waves of existence.
Reflection
When did you last do something you thought was beyond your strength? What was your attention resting on at the time?
Omniscience Everywhere (pp. 138 to 140)
"Just as all knowability, etc., in respect of the body occurs when it is pervaded by that spanda principle, even so when the yogi is established in his essential Self, he will have omniscience, etc. everywhere."
The Verse
Anenadhisthite dehe yatha sarvajnatadayah / Tatha svatmany adhisthanat sarvatraivam bhavisyati //
Commentary Walkthrough
"When the body is pervaded by this, i.e. by the spanda principle... then as experiences of things suited to that state (the bodily state), such as states of all-knowability, all-doership (associated with the body) manifest themselves to the embodied being, so, if the yogi gets established in his imperishable Self... he acquires omniscience, and omnipotence, powers appropriate to Siva everywhere, i.e. from the category of Siva down to earth."
The two methods of becoming established: "either by withdrawing his sense, etc. within himself (sankoca) as a tortoise withdraws its limbs within itself or by the device of the expansion of all-embracing consciousness (vikasa)." Singh's note: sankoca is "withdrawing the attention from the activity of the senses and turning it towards the inner reality"; vikasa "means concentration on the inner reality even while the sense-organs are quite open to the external objects."
The analogy is worth seeing clearly. You already "know everything" about your own body, in the sense that every part of it is present in your awareness at once, and you can move any part of it at will. The verse says that when you are established in the Self, the whole universe becomes like this: your body in the sense of II.3 and 4. The sankoca and vikasa methods correspond exactly to the nimilana and unmilana samadhis of Sections I and II.
Critical Lens
"Omniscience" in the analogy means something like the felt presence of the whole, not information about every fact. Read literally, as knowing all facts everywhere, it is a claim no one has ever demonstrated, and the text offers no demonstration. The more modest reading follows the analogy and is coherent with the rest of the book.
Key Terms
- Sarvajnata: omniscience.
- Sankoca / vikasa: contraction / expansion.
Practice
- Close the eyes and feel the whole body at once. Notice that you know it without looking.
- Then open the eyes and try to feel the room the same way.
Depression, the Plunderer (pp. 140 to 142)
"Just as a plunderer carries away the valuables of the house, even so depression saps away the vitality of the body. This depression proceeds from ignorance. If that ignorance disappears by unmesa, how can that depression last in the absence of its cause?"
The Verse
Glanir viluntthika dehe tasyascajnanatah srtih / Tadunmesa-viluptam cet kutah sa syad ahetuka //
Commentary Walkthrough
Glani "means that disappearance of (essential) delight of the person who considers his body to be the self". The plunderer "steals away the wealth of the highest consciousness, and brings about poverty in the form of limitation". Its cause is "(spiritual) ignorance, i.e. non-recognition of one's essential nature". Singh's note: "It does not mean 'want of education'." Ramakantha: glani is "the loss of innate bliss".
When ignorance is removed by unmesa, "the states of inevitable sufferings to the body, such as illness, etc. will be removed. To the extent to which they are removed to that extent his real nature will shine just as excessively heated gold shines when the dross is removed."
The yogini Madalasa, teaching her children (Markandeya Purana 25.14): "Ye child, do not commit the folly of regarding the body as the self, the body which is like a decaying covering."
Then a further claim: "the yogi who is desirous of limited powers when his body is permeated with the elixir of compenetrative meditation, is free from diseases like wrinkles, grey hair etc."
Singh's Note
"Every body who considers his psychosomatic organism as his Self suffers from this loss. It is only when the empirical self is transcended and one is united to the met-empirical Self that he can have real happiness."
The diagnosis is the valuable part. Glani, a word that covers weariness, dejection and loss of zest, is defined not as an emotion but as the loss of innate delight, caused by identifying with the body. This matches what many people report: a low-grade weariness that no rest cures because it is not physical. The remedy is not a mood change but recognition.
Critical Lens
Modern readers should take care. "Depression" in Singh's translation is not clinical depression, and this verse is not medical advice. A teaching that says dejection disappears when "ignorance" is removed can, if misapplied, lead a sufferer to blame himself for an illness, or to forgo treatment. The claims that illness, wrinkles and grey hair disappear are, like the other powers, unevidenced. And note the subtle ranking: it is the yogi "desirous of limited powers" who gets the cosmetic benefits; the tradition itself regards wanting them as a lower aim.
Key Terms
- Glani: dejection, loss of innate delight.
- Viluntthika: a plunderer.
- Ajnana: ignorance, non-recognition (not lack of learning).
Reflection
Is there a weariness in you that rest does not cure? What would it mean for it to be "the loss of innate delight"?
Unmesa, the Opening Between Thoughts (pp. 142 to 146)
"That should be known as unmesa whence the rise of another thought takes place in the mind of a man who is already engaged in one thought; one should experience it introspectively for oneself." Singh calls this "a very important yoga of this system". It is perhaps the most precise single meditation instruction in the book.
The Verse
Ekacintaprasaktasya yatah syadaparodayah / Unmesah sa tu vijneyah svayam tam upalaksayet //
Commentary Walkthrough
The Vijnanabhairava key. "When the mind of the aspirant that is to quit one object is firmly restrained and does not move towards any other object, it comes to rest in a middle position between the two and through it is unfolded the realization of pure consciousness which transcends all contemplation." (VB 62)
Kshemaraja's reading of "another". "There is the rise of 'another', i.e. there is the manifestation of another superb, transcendental awareness which is full of the bliss of consciousness." It arises "in the yogi who is deeply engrossed, i.e. deeply concentrated in one thought... in which all the fluctuations of the mind are stilled". It arises from the spanda principle "in which the entire multitude of thought-constructs has been suddenly swallowed up on account of the cessation of the object of thought which is due to the swell of deeper consciousness radiating from excessive concentration on that thought".
How to know it. "Since unmesa cannot be grasped objectively as 'this', one has to observe it within oneself by approaching it in the form of I-consciousness with an awareness completely free of all artificial effort. It has to be recognized in the form of extraordinary bliss."
The other reading. "Others interpret this verse in this way: In the mind of a person who is deeply engrossed in thinking of one object, that from which another thought arises and which pervades both the thoughts is unmesa." Singh's note: "aparodayah may mean the rise of another awareness or the rise of another thought."
Singh's Exposition
Singh gives three points. First, on Kshemaraja's reading, "when the mind is deeply engrossed in one thought, it is completely stilled... It is at such a moment that the met-empirical Self reveals itself. Mind is the slayer of the Real. When the slayer is slain, then the Real reveals itself." Second: "If he wants to know it as an object, he will fail miserably, for it is the Eternal Subject which can never be reduced to an object." Ramakantha: "This experience has to be regarded subjectively as 'It is I...'. Its nature cannot be grasped objectively as 'this', like sound etc." Third, Ramakantha's argument against the Buddhists, which Singh quotes in full:
"Some think that the first thought is the cause of the rise of the next, there is nothing intervening between the two... (Ramakantha has the Buddhists in mind.) In reply, it is said that there can be no relation of cause and effect between the first and the second without a third to relate the two as cause and effect. That which relates the previous and the latter as cause and effect, that which is the undeniable relater of the two experiences, that is the pure consciousness that pervades both the thoughts, the fount and origin of every thing, that is the Self. That Self has been called unmesa."
The two readings give two practices, both useful. In Kshemaraja's, you concentrate on one thought so completely that it swallows itself, and what opens is not another thought but awareness itself: concentration until collapse. In the other, you watch the gap as one thought ends and the next arises, and look for what is present across both: the junction practice of I.17 applied to thought. Ramakantha's argument gives a reason why the second should work: whatever relates two thoughts must be present to both, and that is what you are looking for.
Critical Lens
Ramakantha's argument is the strongest philosophical argument in Section III, and it is aimed at the Buddhist theory of momentary mind, in which each moment of consciousness causes the next with no enduring self. A Buddhist would reply that causal relation does not require a third thing that experiences both moments, only that they stand in the right relation; to demand a witness is to assume the conclusion. This is one of the deepest and most enduring debates in Indian philosophy, and neither side has won it. What is not in doubt is the practice: the gap between thoughts is a real, observable feature of experience.
Key Terms
- Unmesa: opening, unfolding.
- Ekacinta-prasakta: absorbed in one thought.
- Aparodaya: the rise of another (thought or awareness).
- Svayam upalaksayet: one should observe it oneself.
Practice
- Concentration until collapse. Hold one simple thought ("I am") for several minutes, with full absorption. Notice what happens when the thought thins out.
- The gap. Watch thoughts arise. As one ends, wait for the next. Look for what is present both before and after.
Light, Sound, Form, Taste: Obstacles (pp. 146 to 148)
"From this (unmesa) appear (supernormal) light, sound, form, taste, in a short time, to the yogi who has not yet done away with the identification of the Self with the body, which, however, are only a disturbing factor (in the full realization of the Spanda principle)."
The Verse
Ato vindur ato nado rupam asmad ato rasah / Pravartante'cirenaiva ksobhakatvena dehinah //
Commentary Walkthrough
Kshemaraja's introduction: the author "exhorts that a great yogi should regard those various supernormal powers as rejectable which arise from the practice of unmesa and which even inferior yogis can acquire with effort."
The four experiences: "light of a star in the middle of the two eye-brows which is a generic light expressive of the entire objective world, sound which is unstruck (spontaneous) which is generic sound representing all undifferentiated words, (supernormal) form which is a glow shining even in darkness, transcendental taste experienced on the tip of the tongue." "They only give him temporary satisfaction, but are a disturbing factor, indeed positive obstacle." Patanjali's Yoga Sutra (III.37) agrees: "These are obstacles in the way of meditation and are regarded as occult powers in vyutthana."
Singh's note: "These powers are a source of attraction to the yogi who has not risen above the level of the psychosomatic organism. But they are an obstacle in the way of spiritual progress, for this yogi gets stuck up in these powers, and misses the real aim of yoga."
This verse is the safeguard of Section III. The inner lights, sounds and tastes that meditators often report, and that some teachers treat as signs of progress or of the guru's grace, are classified here as side effects that happen to those still identified with the body. The phrase "even inferior yogis can acquire" them is a deliberate deflation. Notice the link with I.20, where yogis "satisfied only with the experience of light and sound" are thrown back into the world.
Critical Lens
This verse sits in some tension with the opening foreword of this book. Swami Muktananda's teaching of Siddha Yoga gave a large place to inner lights (notably the "blue pearl") and inner sounds as signs of awakening. The Spandakarika classifies exactly such experiences as obstacles. A reader can reconcile the two (the experiences are fine if not clung to), but should notice that the text is more austere than some of its modern promoters.
Key Terms
- Bindu: light (here, supernormal light between the eyebrows).
- Nada: the unstruck sound.
- Rupa / rasa: form / taste.
- Ksobhaka: disturbing.
Reflection
If you have had any unusual inner experience in meditation, how did you treat it? Did it become something you wanted to repeat?
Wishing to See All Things (pp. 148 to 149)
"When the yogi wishing to see all objects abides in that state pervading them all, i.e. infusing them all with the light of his consciousness, then what is the use of saying much, he will experience for himself (the splendour of that vision)."
The Verse
Didrksayeva sarvarthan yada vyapyavatisthate / Tada kim bahunoktena svayameva avabhotsyate //
Commentary Walkthrough
"Just as at the time of the desire to see by means of indeterminate perception in the case of pasyanti, the object desired to be seen gleams internally in an identical form, even so, when the yogi abides pervading all the objects from the earth right up to Siva... infusing every thing with I-consciousness like Sadasiva, with the thought of I to begin with, relating everything, and finally with thought-free awareness embracing everything within himself, then he will experience that for himself." "Avatisthate" means "when he does not swerve from the perfect accomplishment of meditation". "What is the use of expatiation in this matter?"
Singh's Exposition
"When the yogi sees every object as an expression of the inner divine Self, then the delusion of diversity disappears and he has the bliss of unity consciousness. He finds Siva both within and without."
The word didrksa, "the wish to see", is chosen with care. Before you see anything, there is a movement of wanting-to-see, in which the object is present inside, "gleaming in an identical form", before it is outside. The verse asks you to rest in that stage with respect to everything at once. Kshemaraja's three steps, first "I", then relating everything to I, then thought-free embrace, make it a graded practice. "What is the use of saying much" is the text's honest admission that the rest has to be found.
Key Terms
- Didrksa: the desire to see.
- Pasyanti: the "seeing" level of speech, before words separate.
- Vyapya: pervading.
Practice
Before looking at an object, pause in the wish to look. What is present at that moment, before the object appears?
Deposit Everything in One Place (pp. 149 to 152)
"Observing all objective phenomena by knowledge, i.e. by external perception, one should always remain awake, and should deposit everything in one place, i.e. see everything as identical with Spanda which is our own essential Self. Thus, he is never troubled by another." This is the practical summary of the first two sections, given just before the analysis of bondage.
The Verse
Prabuddhah sarvada tisthej jnanenalokya gocaram / Ekatraropayet sarvam tato'nyena na pidyate //
Commentary Walkthrough
"Always" means "one should keep awake in the beginning, middle, and end of awareness in all the states of waking, dreaming and deep sleep". "Keeping awake" means "one should have full awareness, with divine vision which becomes manifest by getting hold of the Spanda principle".
How? "By observing all phenomena, such as blue, pleasure etc. by external perception, one should offer it to the creator, Sankara, i.e. one's essential nature." "One should offer or deposit everything" means "one should regard it as identical with that Spanda principle whether in introversive or extroversive state; one should, by the firm grip of the initial and the final state, regard the middle state also as the congealment of the sap of consciousness." "Thus, he is not troubled by anything separate, because in everything, he acknowledges his own Self."
Utpaladeva: "O Lord, whence can there be any fear to the eternally happy one, in this world filled with his own Self, who, in thought-free state, sees entire objective phenomena as thy own form."
Singh's Exposition
"Two points have been emphasized in this verse: firstly, the awakened one should be en rapport with the Spanda principle... in all the states of waking, dream and deep sleep and in all conditions, the initial, the middle and the end of those states. Secondly, he should view all objective phenomena only as a manifestation of the inward Light of Consciousness and thus identical with it. Since now there is nothing which is different from his Self, he will have no trouble on any account."
"Deposit everything in one place" (ekatra aropayet) is a vivid instruction. Each perception, as it arises, is handed back to its source, like returning a borrowed thing. It combines the junction practice of I.17 (hold the beginning and end) with the recognition of II.4 (no state is not Siva), and gives a reason why the practice brings peace: fear needs something other than oneself to fear.
Key Terms
- Ekatra aropana: depositing in one place.
- Gocara: the field of the senses.
- Pida: trouble, affliction.
Practice
For ten minutes, as each perception arises (a sound, a sight, an itch), silently "offer" it back to awareness: "this too is you". Notice whether anything feels threatening during the practice.
Bound by Words (pp. 152 to 164)
The previous verse said the awakened one is "never troubled by another". But if the universe is Siva, "who is it that gives trouble, and who is it that is troubled?" These three verses answer with the Spanda school's most distinctive theory of bondage: we are bound by the powers of language.
III.13. "Being deprived of his glory by kala, he (the individual) becomes a victim of the group of Powers arising from the multitude of words, and thus he is known as the bound one (pasu)." III.14. "The rise, in the bound soul, of all sorts of ideas marks the disappearance of the bliss of supreme immortality. On account of this, he loses his independence. The appearance of the ideas has its sphere in sense-objects." III.15. "Brahmi and other Powers are ever in readiness to conceal his real nature, for without the association of words, ideas cannot arise."
The Verses
Sabdarasi-samutthasya saktivargasya bhogyatam / Kalavilupta-vibhavo gatah san sa pasuh smrtah //13 Paramrtarasapayas tasya yah pratyayodbhavah / Tenasvatantratam eti sa ca tanmatragocarah //14 Svarupavarane casya saktayah satatotthitah / Yatah sabdanuvedhena na vina pratyayodbhavah //15
Commentary Walkthrough: Verse 13
The names of the power. The essential nature, "Sankara, of the nature of Light, is proclaimed in the traditional treatises by such words as Spanda, Lalita, Isvara etc." His power "is, in different scriptures, called in various, innumerable ways, such as Para (the Highest), Matsyodari (fish-bellied, i.e. full of creative throb), Mahasatta (the Highest Being), Sphuratta (the glimmer of Light), Urmi (wave), Sara (quintessence), Hrdaya (the Heart), Bhairavi, Devi, Sikha (the Flame)."
AHAM. "The perfect I-consciousness of the Lord (Aham) consisting of the Highest 'A' Power and the innate 'ha' Power encloses within itself as in a bowl all the venerable letters from a to ksa. That (aham) constitutes Para Vak, the Highest Sound which is ever risen, i.e. eternal but unutterable, the great Mantra, the Life of all." Etymology: "spandate iti spandah, 'that which throbs (with life) is spanda'."
From one power to fifty letters. When the Lord "desires to display manifestation", his freedom "becomes Will which assumes the power of cognition and action", then "becomes two in the form of seed (vowel) and matrix (consonant), which respectively indicate Siva and Sakti", "ninefold according to the division of letter-groups, and fiftyfold according to the division of letters". The Malinivijaya passage quoted at length describes this "thought-gem" goddess who becomes "a wearer of a garland of fifty letters".
The goddesses of the letters. Singh's notes list them: the vowel group under Yogisvari or Mahalaksmi; the ka-group under Brahmi; ca under Mahesvari; the two ta-groups under Kaumari and Vaisnavi; pa under Varahi; and so on. He even lists the fifty Rudras (sixteen from the vowels, Amrta, Amrtapurna and so on; thirty-four from the consonants, Jaya, Vijaya and so on).
Four readings of "deprived of glory by kala". Kshemaraja gives four:
- Kala as maya: "from the root 'kal', to throw out... that circumscribes to definite limits, i.e. the power of Maya."
- Kala as the first kancuka, limited activity, which implies all five: "kala, vidya, raga, kala and niyati". Singh's note lists what each contracts: kala reduces omnipotence to limited efficacy; vidya, omniscience to limited knowledge; raga, fullness to desire for particular things; kala (time), eternity to limitation in time; niyati, all-pervasiveness to limitation in space and cause.
- Kala as the letters: "He is deprived of his glory by the goddesses Brahmi and others presiding over the groups of letters... he is tormented by gross and subtle words which penetrate within all kinds of definite and indefinite ideas, and he feels 'I am limited. I am imperfect; I may do something; this I take, this I reject,' etc., and he is thus led to joy or sorrow."
- Kala as a part: "deprived of his glory by a part, i.e. the innate ignorance of his real nature, he becomes limited as it were. In fact, his real nature in the form of Siva has not gone anywhere."
Commentary Walkthrough: Verses 14 and 15
Ideas as ruin. "The rise in that bound soul of ideas whether pertaining to this world or the scriptures... leads to ruination." The bliss "is present even when the ideas... arise yet because it is not noticed, it appears to be absent." The Siva Sutras (I.2): "Limited knowledge is the cause of bondage." Madalasa: "Do not indulge frequently in your association with material assemblage, by prating sometimes with 'O father', sometimes with 'O daughter', sometimes with 'O mother', sometimes with 'O beloved', sometimes with 'mine', sometimes with 'not mine'."
No contradiction. "As long as there is the appearance of different objects, so long the individual is surely bound. When... he has the unswerving knowledge that every thing is identical with Self, then he is liberated while alive." So there is "no inconsistency" between "there is no state which is not Siva" and "the rise of ideas marks the disappearance of bliss": the difference is recognition.
Thought needs words. Ideas "are not possible without the association of words, such as 'I know this.' These ideas may be either tinged with subtle internal words or may be expressed in gross speech. Even lower creatures have a hang of ideas involved in sound... something like the nod of head, in oneself indicative of inward approval. Otherwise the child cannot catch the first conventional sign."
Singh's Exposition
"The individual becomes a tool of ideas... The ideas are entirely governed by words. Words have a tremendous power over his life. Thought-constructs and verbalization become the governing influences of his life... Ideas and words are all conditioned. The essential Self is unconditioned... The unconditioned cannot be known by the conditioned. It is only when the individual frees himself from the shackle of ideas and words that he is free to have an immediate, direct awareness of Self."
This is the Spanda school's theory of bondage in one sentence: you are bound because you think in words, and words divide. The goddesses of the letters are not decoration; they personify the way each sound-group shapes thought. The third reading of kala, where words make one feel "I am limited, I take this, I reject that", is a precise description of the inner commentary that runs through ordinary life. And the argument of verse 15, that even a child must have some pre-verbal "inner word" to learn its first conventional word, is a real philosophical point that Bhartrhari's grammarian tradition made famous. The practical consequence is clear: watch the inner speech, because that is where the binding happens, and where it can be undone.
Critical Lens
The elaborate lists of letter-goddesses and fifty Rudras come from the Malinivijayottara Tantra and reflect a ritual and mantra science that the Spandakarika itself does not spell out; the verse speaks only of "the group of powers arising from the multitude of words". Singh reproduces Kshemaraja's full apparatus faithfully, which is valuable for the scholar but can make the reader think the doctrine depends on it. It does not; the core idea is psychological. The claim that thought is impossible without words is also contested: modern cognitive science finds much non-verbal thinking (in infants, animals and adults). Kshemaraja's answer, that there is a "subtle inner word" even there, saves the theory by extending "word" to cover any meaningful sign, which makes it harder to test.
Key Terms
- Sabdarasi: the mass of sound, the alphabet as cosmic power.
- Pasu: the bound one.
- Matrka: the "little mother", the power of the letters.
- Pratyaya: idea, cognition.
- Para vak: supreme speech, AHAM.
- Kancuka: the five coverings (kala, vidya, raga, kala, niyati).
Practice
- For five minutes, simply listen to your inner speech without joining it. Notice how often it says "I", "this", "not this".
- Find a moment when you understand something before you have put it into words. What is that understanding made of?
The Same Power Binds and Frees (pp. 164 to 166)
"That afore-mentioned operative power of Siva existing in the bound soul is a source of bondage; the same when realized as residing in him as the way of approach to one's own essential reality brings about success (liberation)." Bondage and liberation are not two things but one power, unrecognised and recognised.
The Verse
Seyam kriyatmika saktih sivasya pasuvartini / Bandhayitri svamargastha jnata siddhyupapadika //
Commentary Walkthrough
"She has been called 'this', because she manifests herself in the form of objectivity. She is the venerable Spanda principle. She is known as operative power (kriya sakti), because she brings about the state of variety of the universe." "She besprinkles this bound soul who is identified with prana and puryastaka with a drop of I-consciousness which makes him an agent or doer. Reduced to this state, he does not recognize his real nature which is veiled by her and gets involved in the misery of seizing and relinquishing. Thus she becomes a source of bondage."
When the yogi recognises "this operative power as the Supreme power (para sakti)", she brings about the highest achievement. Vijnanabhairava 20: "When in one who enters the state of Sakti there ensues the feeling of non-distinction (between Sakti and Siva), then he acquires the state of Siva, for in the agamas she (sakti) is declared as the door of entrance." Or when "in spite of the dispersion of definite and indefinite ideas, [he] regards the entire objectivity as an aspect of his own Self".
Singh's notes give the "meeting point" at each level: in anava upaya, between prana and apana at the hrdaya, "the depression a little above the diaphragm"; in sakta upaya, between knowledge and object; in sambhava upaya, between jnana and kriya. The second method is "the Sambhava form of realization".
Singh's Exposition
"The power of ideation and verbalization is an aspect of the kriya sakti of Siva. When the empirical individual considers kriyasakti as a power of his psycho-somatic organism, he is bound by its limitations and suffers. When he regards this kriyasakti only as an aspect of parasakti, the meeting point of prana and apana, pramana and prameya, jnana and kriya, human and divine, then he is liberated."
The structure here is the key to the whole Spanda teaching: there is no separate enemy. The power that makes you feel like a limited doer, "seizing and relinquishing", is the very power that, recognised, is "the door" into Siva. This means you do not need to fight thought, desire or activity; you need to see them as the one power. The "meeting points" in Singh's notes give a practical way in: the pause between in-breath and out-breath, the instant where knowing and known touch.
Critical Lens
This verse resolves the earlier tension between "nothing is not Siva" and "ideas are bondage" elegantly, and it also shows why the system is so hard to argue with: whatever happens can be described as the same power, recognised or unrecognised. That is its strength as a contemplative orientation and its weakness as a theory, since nothing could count against it.
Key Terms
- Kriya sakti: the operative power.
- Bandhayitri: that which binds.
- Svamargastha: established in one's own path.
- Siddhi: success, accomplishment.
Practice
Rest attention at the turn of the breath, after an exhalation ends and before the next inhalation begins. Stay there gently for twenty breaths.
The Subtle Body and Rebirth (pp. 166 to 169)
"Besieged by puryastaka which rises from tanmatras and exists in mind, I-feeling, and the determinative faculty, he (the bound soul) becomes subservient and undergoes the experiences that arise from it in the form of ideas about certain objects and the pleasure or pain that accrues from them. Owing to the continuance of the puryastaka, he leads transmigratory existence. We are therefore going to explain what causes the extirpation of this transmigratory existence."
The Verses
Tanmatrodaya-rupena mano'ham-buddhivartina / Puryastakena samruddhas taduttham pratyayodbhavam //17 Bhunkte paravaso bhogam tadbhavat samsared atah / Samsrti-pralayasyasya karanam sampracaksmahe //18
Commentary Walkthrough
"Through the association of words, he is, at every step, driven hither and thither by Brahmi and other goddesses. He is not independent like the fully awakened yogi." "Owing to the continuance of that puryastaka, the residual traces of cravings and desires lying submerged in it are awakened again and again and thus he transmigrates from one form of life to another, getting bodies suited for the appropriate experiences." The cure: "the easy means of the extirpation of the transmigratory tendency... through the total extermination of the impurities inherent in it." A grammatical note: the present tense "we explain" means past and future too, by Panini's rule, so the means have been and will be taught in this treatise.
Singh's Exposition
Singh gives his clearest account of rebirth in the book. The puryastaka, the "city of eight", "consists of the five tanmatras or the subtle aspects of the gross physical objects and buddhi, manas and ahamkara. The impressions of our desires and thoughts are deposited in this puryastaka. When a man dies, it is only his physical body that is dissolved. The puryastaka remains as the subtle vehicle of the soul after his death... The desires and ideas deposited in the puryastaka are not inert elements but tremendous psychic forces seeking expression. So in the next life, man gets a body suited for the expression of the desires, etc." It "plays a double role": it shapes ideas in this life and wholly determines the next. Hence Kshemaraja: "The transmigratory existence can be stopped by the extermination of the impurities of the puryastaka."
Whatever one thinks of rebirth, the description of the puryastaka as a store of "psychic forces seeking expression" that shapes which ideas arise in you now is psychologically acute. Your thoughts are not neutral reports; they are coloured, even chosen, by accumulated desire. Verse 17's phrase "ideas arising from it" (taduttham pratyayodbhavam) is a teaching about present experience as much as future birth.
Critical Lens
Singh presents rebirth via the subtle body as fact ("When a man dies, it is only his physical body that is dissolved"). It is the doctrine of the text and of almost all Indian traditions of the period, but it is a doctrine, not a finding, and a modern reader is entitled to take the psychological reading without the metaphysical one. The language of "extermination of impurities" also sits slightly oddly with I.9's insistence that mala is not a substance; here the impurities are spoken of as if they could be removed like dirt. The best reading is that "extermination" means the end of misidentification.
Key Terms
- Puryastaka: the subtle body, "city of eight".
- Tanmatra: the subtle elements of perception.
- Paravasa: dependent, subservient.
- Samsrti: transmigration.
Reflection
Notice the next thought that arises. Can you trace it to a desire or fear behind it?
Lord of the Wheel (pp. 169 to 171)
"When, however, he is firmly rooted in that supreme Spanda principle, then bringing the emergence and dissolution of the puryastaka entirely under his control, he becomes the real enjoyer and thenceforth the lord of the collective whole of the Saktis." The book's argument comes full circle: I.1 praised Sankara, "the source of the wheel of powers"; III.19 says the yogi becomes cakresvara, the lord of that wheel.
The Verse
Yada tvekatra samrudhas tada tasya layodayau / Niyacchan bhoktrtam eti tatascakresvaro bhavet //
Commentary Walkthrough
When he "becomes fully and unswervingly established in the Spanda principle, which is the perfect I-consciousness, i.e. when he becomes identical with it, then he can bring under his control the emergence and the dissolution of the puryastaka... and through it also of the universe by means of the introversive and extroversive meditation." By "assimilating to himself all the objective categories from the earth up to Siva by the process of recognition", he "rises to the status of the Supreme Experient that he was already (satim eva)." "In other words, he attains to the highest lordship in this very body."
"Thus the glorious Vasugupta, showing the sameness of the great reality both in the beginning and end of the book, brings out the importance of this Sastra as the essence and crown of the entire secret doctrine of Saivism." Thus ends Section III, Vibhutispanda.
Singh's Exposition
This is Singh's most lyrical page: "This verse describes the end of the journey. A spark of the Divine flame descends into matter and forgets its divine origin. Like an exile it wanders into distant lands and in different forms. At the human stage, it acquires the gift of speech and mentation... The human being as now known sows his wild oats, reaps the consequences and learns the inexorable laws of life in the bitter school of experience. A time comes when he is filled with nostalgia, and now begins his journey homeward. He has not to go far. He has only to throw off the mask of the pseudo-I and enter his essential, real I, which is the Spanda, the heart-beat of Siva. He now becomes what he always was. The universe is no longer a foreign land. The I and the This, the Subject and the object become one. That is an experience for which there is no word in the human language."
"That he was already" (satim eva) is the whole teaching in two words. Lordship over the wheel of powers is not acquired; it is recognised, which is why the Pratyabhijna school is called the school of recognition and why this verse can close the circle with the first. The "powers" of Section III, at their highest, are not tricks but this: no longer being pushed by one's own thoughts and senses, because one knows them as one's own rays.
Critical Lens
Singh's "exile and homecoming" narrative, with its descent into matter and evolutionary ascent, is beautiful, and it is his own. It owes much to Neoplatonic and Aurobindonian imagery (and to the parable of the prodigal son, "wild oats" and all). Kshemaraja's account is less narrative and more structural: nothing ever really descended, since the Lord "veils by way of sport". Both are ways of telling the same doctrine; the reader should simply know which voice is speaking. Kshemaraja's claim that the Spandakarika is "the crown of the entire secret doctrine of Saivism" is the claim of a partisan of this school.
Key Terms
- Cakresvara: lord of the wheel (of powers).
- Laya / udaya: dissolution / emergence.
- Bhoktr: the true enjoyer.
- Satim eva: who already was.
Reflection
What would it mean to be the "lord" of your own thoughts, not by controlling them, but by recognising them as your own?
The Closing Verses (pp. 172 to 177)
Section IV is two closing verses and Kshemaraja's colophon. The first salutes the guru's word and, by double meaning, spanda as supreme speech. The second gives the book's own origin story, its promise and its rule of secrecy.
Verse IV.1: The Boat Across Doubt
Agadhasamsayambhodhi-samuttaranatarinim / Vande vicitrarthapadam citram tam gurubharatim //
"I pay my homage to that wonderful speech of my guru which is like a boat for crossing the fathomless ocean of doubt and is full of words which yield wonderful meaning." And: "I offer my reverential prayer to Spanda in the form of para vak, the Supreme divine I-consciousness... which acts like a boat in crossing the fathomless ocean of doubt regarding my essential nature."
Kshemaraja reads every word twice. "Guru" means both "teacher" and "supreme" (mahati); "gurubharati" is both "the exhortative speech of the teacher" and para vak, which "encloses within her embrace pasyanti etc." "Vande" means "I pay homage" for the teacher and "I enter it" for para vak. The doubt is "the absence of certainty regarding the Supreme I". The goddess "acts as an acarya (teacher), inasmuch as she is the means of entry into the state of Siva", since "Sakti is the door of entrance into Siva".
Verse IV.2: The Treasure in the Cave of the Heart
Labdhvapy alabhyam etaj jnanadhanam hrdguhantakrtanihiteh / Vasuguptavac chivaya hi bhavati sada sarvalokasya //
"As on the attainment of this treasure of knowledge which is difficult of attainment, and on its being well preserved in the cave of the heart, it has been for the good of Vasugupta, so also... it would always be for the good of all."
Kshemaraja: "Though it is difficult of attainment, Vasugupta obtained it on the surface of a rock as the essence of Sankara's instruction in a dream." The "heart" is "prakasa (light) or consciousness and vimarsa or awareness of the consciousness", a cave because "it provides room for entry into the all-of-reality". "There is no restriction of rules governing the recipient of this knowledge." Yet it is for their good "when they preserve it carefully in the cave of their heart and guarding it against those who have not got the same faith, assimilate it fully by firm realization".
Kshemaraja's Concluding Remarks
"Though there is no end to the number of commentaries on this Sastra, and though there are intelligent people, yet they are mostly superficial by nature, but they who are competent, who are intelligent swans and are skilled in grasping the essence, know the special merit of my commentary. My teacher could not put up with being bracketed with the numerous other ordinary run of commentators, so he did not write any commentary on Spanda-sastra." He wrote this one "owing to the fervent entreaty of my pupil named Sura", "with the help of the splendid detailed exposition of my teacher" (Abhinavagupta).
"They are not qualified for the study of this sastra whose intelligence is not purified by the teaching of right sort of teachers, whose doubt has not been shattered by the esoteric teaching of Saiva discipline, and who, being of tender intellect, have not tasted previously the nectar of Pratyabhijna."
He ends: "All glory to this Supreme Creative Pulsation (Spanda) of consciousness which is the abode of flashing, unparalleled delight, whose majesty of path extends to far-reaching areas from the earth up to Siva... and of whose extension this universe is just a minute particle."
Critical Lens
Three things in these pages deserve comment.
- The rock and the dream. Here Kshemaraja says Vasugupta found "this" teaching "on the surface of a rock" in a dream. That is the legend usually told of the Siva Sutras. Applying it here, to the Spandakarikas, fits Kshemaraja's view that Vasugupta wrote both, and the verse he relies on is the one that Singh's Preface noted is "not found in the recension of Bhatta Utpala, Kallata and Ramakantha". The concluding verse that settles the authorship question is itself textually doubtful.
- Open and closed at once. "No restriction of rules governing the recipient" (no caste or initiation bar) sits beside "guarding it against those who have not got the same faith" and a list of the unqualified. The tension is typical of esoteric traditions moving towards a wider audience. Singh's translation, of course, is itself an act of opening the text to everyone.
- The tone. Kshemaraja's final words on rival commentators ("mostly superficial") and on his teacher's refusal to be "bracketed" with them confirm what the whole commentary has shown: this is a brilliant and partisan reading, written to establish one lineage's interpretation as definitive.
Taken together, the two verses name the two supports of this path: the teacher's word and the inner word, which Kshemaraja reads as one. The final image, that the universe is "a minute particle" of the extension of spanda, reverses ordinary perspective: it is not consciousness that is a small thing within the universe, but the universe within consciousness.
Key Technical Terms
Singh's book ends with a glossary of technical terms (pp. 178 onward), compiled with the same care as his Pratyabhijnahrdayam glossary. The selection below gives the terms most needed to read this guide, in Singh's definitions where possible.
| Term | Singh's sense |
|---|---|
| A | "Symbol of Siva, short form of anuttara... the one letter that pervades all the other letters" |
| Abhiyoga | "Backward reference of awareness" |
| Adhisthatr | "The superintending, governing, presiding principle" |
| Agni / Soma (Indu) / Surya | knower or knowledge / object, apana / prana; symbols that shift by level |
| Anava, sakta, sambhava upaya | the three means: through body, prana and mind; through purified thought; through will and direct insight |
| Anupaya | "Spontaneous realization of Self without any special effort" |
| Anusandhana | "Repeated intensive awareness of the source... joining the succeeding experience to the previous one" |
| Atma-vyapti / Siva-vyapti | realisation of the Self / of Self and universe as Siva |
| Cakresvara | "The master or lord of the group of saktis" |
| Camatkara | "Bliss of the pure I-consciousness; wondrous delight" |
| Glani | dejection; the loss of innate delight |
| Kancuka | "The coverings of Maya... converting Siva into jiva": kala, vidya, raga, kala, niyati |
| Karanesvari | the circles Khecari, Gocari, Dikcari, Bhucari |
| Krtrima | "Constructed by vikalpa or determinate idea; pseudo" |
| Ksobha | "Identification of the Self with the gross or the subtle body"; agitation |
| Mala | limiting condition: anava, mayiya, karma |
| Nimesa / unmesa | closing / opening; dissolution / manifestation; in yoga, unmesa is "the emergence of the spiritual consciousness which is the background of the rise of ideas" |
| Nimilana / unmilana samadhi | inward absorption with senses withdrawn / outward-open absorption |
| Pancakrtya | "The ceaseless five-fold act of Siva": manifestation, maintenance, withdrawal, concealment, grace |
| Para vak | supreme speech, AHAM |
| Pasu / pati | the bound one / the liberated experient |
| Puryastaka | the subtle body: five tanmatras, buddhi, manas, ahamkara |
| Samanya / visesa spanda | generic / particular pulsation |
| Suprabuddha / prabuddha / aprabuddha | fully awake / partly awake / unawake |
| Turya | the fourth state |
| Udyama | "The sudden spontaneous emergence of the Supreme I-consciousness" |
| Vamesvari | the goddess of the reverse and beautiful course, source of the four circles |
| Vikalpa / nirvikalpa | thought-construct / free of thought-constructs |
| Vismaya | amazement, wonder |
What the Spanda-Karikas Teaches
The Teaching in One Paragraph
Reality is consciousness, and consciousness is not still: it pulses. Every opening and closing of the eyes, every perception's going-out and coming-back, every arising and ending of a thought, is the same divine pulsation, spanda, by which Siva manifests and withdraws the universe. You are that pulsation, but you have identified with its contracted forms: the body, the breath, the stream of inner words. The path is to catch the pulse at its moments of exposure (the junctions between states, the gap between thoughts, the instant when intense emotion halts the mind) and to stay awake there, until the recognition that "there is no state which is not Siva" holds through waking, dream and sleep. Then the same power that bound you is recognised as your own, and you become, as you always were, the lord of its wheel.
The Six Big Ideas
| Idea | Where | In brief |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Reality is dynamic | I.1, I.2 | consciousness is not inert witness but creative pulse, "the opening and closing of whose eyes" makes and unmakes the world |
| 2. The knower cannot be an object | I.5, I.12 to 16 | the Self is the seer of all the seen; even an experience of void implies the experiencer; "the Experient never takes a holiday" |
| 3. The gaps are the doorways | I.17, I.22, III.9 | junctions between states and thoughts, and moments when strong emotion halts the mind, expose spanda |
| 4. The world is to be included, not escaped | II.3 to 7 | "no state is not Siva"; outward-open (unmilana) realisation completes inward (nimilana) realisation |
| 5. Bondage is linguistic | III.13 to 15 | the powers of the letters make us feel limited; "without words, ideas cannot arise" |
| 6. One power binds and frees | III.16, III.19 | the operative power, unrecognised, binds; recognised, it is the door; the yogi becomes lord of the wheel "that he was already" |
How Kshemaraja Shapes the Text
| Feature of the commentary | Effect |
|---|---|
| Reads Vasugupta as author | raises the Siva Sutras to revealed status; unites the two texts under one canon |
| Finds Krama and Trika "suggested" in verses | integrates the Spanda school into the synthesis of Abhinavagupta's lineage |
| Long polemics against Buddhists and Vedantins | defines the school against rivals, often by simplifying their views |
| Detailed practice instructions (Bhairava-mudra, dream yoga, tortoise device) | makes the short verses into a practical manual |
| Literal reading of the powers | preserves the Tantric world of siddhis that the verses mention only briefly |
| Protection of ritual initiation | keeps the institution while relativising it |
Singh's Contribution, and His Frames
What he does exceptionally well. Singh gives a complete, readable English version of Kshemaraja with the verses in transliteration, and, most usefully, he quotes the rival commentators (Kallata, Ramakantha, Utpala Bhatta) in his Expositions. This lets a reader check Kshemaraja against the older tradition. He also corrects Kshemaraja openly when he thinks him wrong, as on the Vedantic "Purusa" (II.7) and the inconsistency of the saktis (I.19).
What to watch for. Singh reads through three frames that are his, not the text's:
- Evolutionary spirituality, close to Sri Aurobindo ("the divine plan of evolution", "Integral Divine Consciousness", "at the human level ascent can start").
- Western devotional and literary echoes (Tennyson, the prodigal son, "Our wills are ours").
- The guru frame set by the book's foreword and dedication, which tends to read the text's unverifiable claims as established.
None of these is a fault; every translator has a frame. They are worth naming because the reader can then choose.
An Honest Assessment
Strengths.
- The Spandakarika's central intuition, that consciousness is active and pulsating, not a static witness, is distinctive in Indian thought and gives a philosophical basis for engaging the world rather than withdrawing from it.
- Its practical teachings (the junctions, the gap between thoughts, intense emotion as doorway, depositing everything in one place) are precise, testable in experience and usable by anyone.
- Its account of bondage through inner speech anticipates insights in later philosophy of language and in contemplative psychology.
- Its own safeguards (I.20, III.10) against attachment to inner lights, sounds and powers are sound and still needed.
Weaknesses.
- The arguments against rivals mostly assume the conclusion: they show that no experience of the Self's absence is possible, then treat this as proof of an eternal Self.
- The polemic against Madhyamaka misrepresents emptiness as "universal extinction"; the attack on Vedanta rests partly on a misreading Singh himself flags.
- Claims of omniscience, dream control, power over others' minds and freedom from grey hair are asserted without evidence.
- The authorship question is unsettled, and the commentary's position on it serves its canonical agenda.
- Esotericism and guru-dependence are built into the text's frame ("serve reverentially the real spiritual guide", "guarding it against those who have not got the same faith"), with the risks that history has shown.
Verdict. As a contemplative manual, the Spanda-Karikas with Kshemaraja's commentary is one of the richest texts of the Indian tradition, and Jaideva Singh's edition remains the most accessible way into it in English. As a philosophical argument, it is persuasive within its own premises and much weaker outside them. Read it as an invitation to look, and test every claim in your own experience, which is exactly what the text itself asks: "svayam tam upalaksayet", "one should observe it oneself".
A Graded Practice Path
The book's practices can be arranged in a sequence, from the simplest to the most demanding. Each stage builds on the previous one. Spend at least a few weeks at each.
| Stage | Practice | Source | What to notice |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Opening and closing | Notice the opening and closing of the eyes, and of attention, as a pulse | I.1 | the instant of opening, before an object is seized |
| 2. The senses | Watch each perception go out, rest and return | I.6 and 7 | what powers the senses; it cannot be seen as an object |
| 3. Junctions of the day | Catch the moments of falling asleep and waking | I.17, III.1 and 2 | the gap before the "specific knowledge" of a state takes over |
| 4. The gap between thoughts | Concentrate on one thought until it thins; or watch the gap as one ends | III.9 | what is present across both thoughts |
| 5. Breath turns | Rest at the turn of the breath | III.16 notes, I.11 | the meeting point of prana and apana |
| 6. Small shocks | When startled, irritated or delighted, turn inward at once | I.22 | the halted mind, before the story begins |
| 7. Bhairava-mudra | Eyes open, attention inward | I.11 | the world appearing "like reflections in a mirror" |
| 8. Inner speech | Listen to inner words without joining them | III.13 to 15 | the "I am limited, I take, I reject" commentary |
| 9. Depositing everything | Hand each perception back to awareness | III.12, II.4 | the absence of fear when nothing is other |
| 10. Continuity | Keep the recognition through the whole day, "like a flow of oil" | I.21, Siva Sutras III.20 | how often it lapses, without self-blame |
Three cautions from the text itself:
- Do not cling to inner lights, sounds or powers (I.20, III.10). They are side effects.
- Do not slacken at the summit (I.25). A quiet, blank state is not liberation unless the knower stays awake in it.
- Do not want your way in (I.8). Desire is an outward movement; let it settle, then notice.
One caution from this guide: the strong-emotion practices (I.22) are best tried with small, everyday shocks first. Anyone with a history of trauma, severe anxiety or depression should approach them carefully and, where appropriate, with professional support. The text assumes a practitioner already grounded in steady alertness.
Closing Note
The word spanda names a paradox the whole book circles: a movement that is not a movement, a "vibrationless vibration", the stillness of consciousness that is nevertheless never inert. Vasugupta, or Kallata, put it into a little over fifty verses; Kshemaraja surrounded those verses with a commentary of great learning and greater confidence; Jaideva Singh made both available to anyone who reads English. The best way to honour all three is to do what the text keeps asking: stop, at the next gap, and look.