Abhinavagupta: An Historical and Philosophical Study (1st Edition) [Compressed]
by Dr. Kanti Chandra Pandey

This is a definitive scholarly work on the philosophy and practice of Kashmir Shaivism by the self-realized master Swami Lakshmanjoo.This book, Kashmir Shaivism: the Secret Supreme, by the twentieth century's great philosopher saint Swami Lakshmanjoo, presents a systematic unfolding of the Tantric teachings of the ancient tradition known as Kashmir Shaivism. This profound tradition, long enshrouded in secrecy, is so rich and detailed in its descriptions of what it reveals as the ascent of individual consciousness to universal God Consciousness that it has been characterized as a ‘mystical geography of awareness’. Within the pages of this book is found the key of the oral tradition which unlocks its secrets and provides the reader with the tools necessary to venture into this wondrous landscape.

Kashmir Shaivism: The Secret Supreme
revealed by Swami Lakshmanjoo

This book teaches 112 dharanas or ways of centring awareness and entering divine consciousness, which include ordinary and extraordinary experiences, as well as tantric methods of spiritual practice such as kundalini, mantra and mudra. This ancient text is of great relevance for a spirituality of our times which has to integrate all aspects of life.

Vijnana Bhairava: The Practice of Centering Awareness
commentary by Swami Lakshman Joo; translation by Bettina Baumer

Abhinavagupta's commentary on the Bhagavad Gita, Hindu philosophical classic; Includes Sanskrit text with English translation.

Abhinavagupta's Commentary on the Bhagavad Gita
by Gitartha Samgraha; translated by Boris Marjanovic

Hiranya:
For human benefit

Om houm joom sah Om bhur bhuvah swah Om trayambakam yajamahe sugandhim pushtivardhanam oorvarukmiva bandhnaan mrityormukshiya maamritaat Om swah bhuvah bhuh
Om sah joom houm Om...

This is the beeja mantra of Maa Mrityunjaya mantra

You can recite it whenever your heart and your soul feels your mouth needs to do it

Rules are made in order not to abuse nor misuse it

Ancient times Brahmins encustody these secrets

Nowadays these secrets are opened

To all

It is not just a calendar which may influence the recitation of a mantra

It is -in the reality- the clarity of mind who does it

Mantra looks for you
You never look for them.

Kulavadhūta : These people are supposed to have taken initiation from the Kaula sampradaya or people who awakened their Kundalini and capable of merging it at Sahashra Chakra or people who are capable of raising their awareness to Turiya and Turiyatita states. They are adepts in Kundalini Tantra. It is very difficult to recognize these people as they do not wear any signs outside which can identify them from others. The speciality of these people is that they remain and live like usual people do.

त्र्यम्बकं यजामहे सुगंधिं पुष्टिवर्धनम |
उर्वारुकमिव बन्धनामृत्योर्मूक्षीय मामुतात || 

Om tryambakam yajamahe sugandhim pushtivardhanam;
Urvarukamiva bandhanan Mrityormukshiya mamritat.

Viniyog
Om asya shri mahamrityunjaya mantrasya vashishtha rishihi anushtup chhandah shri mahamrityunjaya rudra devta houm beejam joom shaktihi sah keelakam (Shri Asharamji Sadguru Devasya aayuhu aarogya yashah keerti pushtihi vriddhi arthey) jape viniyogah

‘I venerate the Supreme Being, the creator of Lord Brahma, Lord Vishnu and Lord Shiva. He whose fame pervades the entire universe. He who is the primeval source of the universe and bestows boons and supernatural powers to those who worship Him. I pray to Him to liberate me from death and this mortal world, which has separated me from Him, like a cucumber separates itself from the creeper; and thus grant me immortality’ (inseparable union of the individual soul with the Supreme Being )
Riguveda : 7.59.12, Yajurveda: 3.60

 

Mantra
Om houm joom sah Om bhur bhuvah swah Om trayambakam yajamahe sugandhim pushtivardhanam oorvarukmiva bandhnaan mrityormukshiya maamritaat Om swah bhuvah bhuh
Om sah joom houm Om...

kārpūr gāūram kāruṇāvatāraṁ —

Śaivagama

Śaivāgama (शैवागम).—The Śaiva Āgamas are valuable sources of information about Śaivite temples–from the selection of the site up to the installation of images.

Source: DSpace at Pondicherry: Siddha Cult in Tamilnadu (shaivism)

Extracted from"The Canon of the Saivagama and the Kubjika Tantras of the Western kaula Tradition

https://archive.org/stream/TheCanonOfTheSaivagamaAndTheKubjikaTantrasOfTheWesternKaula/Canonaivgama_djvu.txt


Śaivāgama (शैवागम) represents one of the three classes of āgamas (traditionally communicated wisdom).—The Śaivāgamas represent the wisdom that has come down from lord Śiva, received by Pārvatī and accepted by Viṣṇu so, it is termed as āgama. Or, it represents the wisdom proceeded from the mouth of Śiva, received by Pārvatī, which is capable of removing three impurities are called as āgamas.

Śaiva-āgama is again divided in to four groups viz. Śaiva, Pāśupata, Soma and Lākula. Śaiva is further divided in to Dakṣiṇa, Vāma and Siddhānta. Dakṣina is again divided in to Bhairava and Aghora. Vāma is again divided in to Anādi, Pūrva and Paścima. Bhairava again divided in to Mahāvrata, Kālāmukha, Kāpāla and Pāśupata. Siddhānta again divided in to two groups viz. Śivabheda and Rudrabheda.

Each of the Āgama is divided in to four parts. They are called as Vidyāpāda (or Jñānapāda), Yogapāda, Kriyāpāda and Caryāpāda.

Source: Shodhganga: Iconographical representations of Śiva

Śaivāgama (शैवागम) refers the canonical texts of Śaivism. The āgama texts are the philosophical base of the Śiddhānta school of Śaivism, most popular in the south of India, especially in Tamil Nadu. Śaivāgamas also contain technical manuals on temple building as well as ritual manuals on worship. Both temple building and ritual worship at the temple continue to follow the āgamas even today.

The Śaiva-āgamas (Śaivāgama, Śivāgama, Śivaśāstra) are the canonical texts of Śaivism. Pūrvakāmikāgama states that even though said in several ways, the twenty eight āgamas with the four pādas are the only source of bhoga and mokṣa. Jagdish Chandra Chatterjee (1962) traces the origin of Śaivāgama to the Vedic Revelations: “In Kashmir itself… Shivagama is regarded as of high antiquity, indeed of eternal existence like the Vedas”.

Source: Shodhganga: Temple management in the Āgamas

The Jain Somadeva confirms that Trika was known in South India during / the tenth century. Somadeva identifies the followers of the Trikamata as ) Kaulas who worship Siva in the company of their Tantric consorts by offering him meat and wine. It is worth noting incidently that Somadeva ' was very critical of the Trika Kaulas,
"If liberation," he says, "were the result of a loose, undisciplined life, then thugs and butchers would surely sooner attain to it than these Kaulas!"
Although Somadeva was a Jama monk and so would naturally disapprove of such practices and tend to take extreme views, it appears nonetheless that Trika was not always as elevated as it now seems to us to be. Although the Pascimamnaya is entirely confined to Nepal at present, it was, according to one of its most important Tantras, the Kubjikamata, spread by the goddess to every corner of India, right up to Kanyakuman in the South, identified, by allusion, with Kubjika the goddess of the Pascimamnaya.
A long list of initiates into the Pascimamnaya and their places of residence is recorded in the Kubjikanityahnikatilaka, a work written before the twelfth century. It is clear from this list that the cult had spread throughout India although it was certainly more popular in the North i2 That the Pakimamnaya was known in South India in the thirteenth century is proved by references in Mahesvarananda's Maharthamanjari to the Kubjikamata as well as a work called "pascimam "which may or may not be the same work but most probably belongs to the same tradition.
An old, incomplete manuscript of the Kubjikamata is still preserved in the manuscript library of the University of Kerala in Trivandrum
Despite relatively early references to the existence of Agamic Saivism in the South, it seems th

at the Saivagamas originally flourished in northern India spreading to the South only later. Madhyadesa (an area covering eastern Utter Pradesh and west Bihar) was, according to Abhinavagupta, considered to be the "repository of all scripture" -hence also of the Saivagama and the Kuiasastra
The importance of this part of India is indirectly confirmed by the fact that Benares, in the centre of this area, is to be visualized as a sacred place (pifha) located in the heart of the body in the course of the Kaula ritual described in Taniraloka
Similarly Prayaga and Varanasi are projected in the same way onto the centre of the body during the ritual described in the Yoginihrdaya a Kaula Tantra of the original Saivagama. The sacred circle (mantfala) shown to the neophyte tn the course of his initiation into the cult of the Brahmayamala is to be drawn in a cremation ground with the ashes of a cremated human corpse. In it are worshipped Yaksas, Pisacas and other demonic beings, including Raksasas M led by Ravana, who surround Bhairava to whom wine is offered with ' oblations of beef and human flesh prepared in a funeral pyre. The name of this circle is the "Great Cremation Ground" -mahasmasana- and is to be drawn in Varanasi. Siddhesvari is a quarter of Benares named after a goddess worshipped there; she was originally called Siddhayogesvari, an important goddess of the Trika. Although the Pascimamnaya was not popular in Kashmir, we must first examine the monistic Kashmiri sources to understand something of the development of the Saivagama and the relationship between the different groups which constituted it, including the Kaula group to which the Pascimamnaya belongs. This is because Abhinavagupta's Trika encompassed the entire spectrum of Saiva Agamic cults ranging from these of the Saivasiddhanta and the Siddhanta-type ritual of the Svacchanda cult ,popular in Kashmir, right through to those of the Bhairavaiantras and Kutagamas to Trika. There are references to more than five hundred lost works within this range. Many of these Tantras and related works must still have existed in the thirteenth century when Jayaratha commented on the Tantraloka and quoted extensively from these sources. From the manner in which he talks about these Tantras it appears that some at least of the rituals they described continued to be performed in his time.
However, outside the Himalayan region matters were different. Thus, although the Siddhanta flourished in the South, we can infer from the numerous references in Mahesvarananda's Maharihamanjarl, written about this time, that a good number of the primary Tantras familiar to Abhinavagupta were not known in the South. However, the secondary works associated with them (many still scripture in their own right) as well as Kashmiri works of known authors and texts belonging to the Kramanaya had been carefully preserved and even added to. A great deal of this literature has been lost. There is no denying the fact that a relatively sudden interruption of the traditions associated with these texts has taken place: a break has occurred in the development of the Tantras. Within two or three centuries not only had the bulk of the Bhairavaiantras and similar Tantric works been lost, but even Abhinava- gupta and the monist Kashmiri authors seem, except in a few isolated cases, to have disappeared. It was only in the beginning of this century that the works of these authors started to be rescued from oblivion when their works began to be edited by Kashmiri scholars employed in a government research centre at Srinagar which published them as the Kashmir Series of Texts and Studies. The study of these texts made scholars aware of the loss of a large and rich corpus of Tantric literature. Indeed, this loss has been so great that all the developments in monistic Tantra after Abhinavagupta, with the important exception of the cult of Srividya, were fresh beginnings which had little direct connection with the older corpus, so much so that the younger scriptures are no longer called "Saivagamas" but "Tantras."

Thus the term "Tantra," which has anyway a wide range of connotations, 26 is used at times to denote a Sakta Tantric scripture to distinguish it from a Saiva Agama, whereas we find both words used in the early corpus without distinction. 17 The reason for this loss has certainly much to do with the ethos of Hinduism itself and its history as a whole. The secrecy that these types of Tantras have always imposed on themselves is indicative of the uneasiness which these Tantric cultural elements must have aroused in many.
Thus the Puranas, which are from many points of view the bastions and guardians of Hindu orthodoxy, initially tended to reject the authority of the Tantras and so largely avoided quoting from them.
However, insofar as the Puranas aimed to be complete compendiums of Hindu spirituality and practice, they later included long sections from Tantric sources, especially when dealing with ritual, the building and consecration of temples, yoga and related matters.
Thus there is much Tantric material to be found everywhere in the Puranas.
The "Brahmavaivartapurarta" contains a brilliant theological exposition of the Supreme as the Goddess Nature -Prakrii', which is a theme dear to Tantra in its later phases. The Devi Devibhagavata, the Kalika and large portions of the Narada Puraoas are extensively Tantric. The hymns eulogizing the names of the goddess, accounts of her actions, lists of female attendants of male gods, their Mantras, Yantras and much more show how strong the influence of Tantric ideas was on the Puranas. They also demonstrate that such trends were not only clearly apparent in the history of the development of Tantra but applied to them also. These developments, in other words, concerned the whole of the literate tradition, and so the Puranas could, without difficulty or self-contradiction, incorporate relevant material from the Tantras.
These incorporations were drawn from the entire range of Tantric sources available at the time in which they were made. It seems likely, in fact, that a possible way in which we can gain some idea of when these Tantric passages were added to the Puranic text is to establish the type of Tantric source from which they were drawn. No one has yet attempted to apply this method in an extensive or systematic way. However, the validity of this approach finds the support of R. C. Hazra, who in his work does attempt to date some Puranic passages on this basis. The Agni and Garuga Puraoas, for example, deal extensively with Tantric topics.
Their treatment is based largely on the Saivagamas and Pancaratrasamhitas which belong to the early Tantric period, i.e., prior to the tenth century. As an example relevant to the study of the Pascimamnaya, we may cite chapters 143-147 of the "Agnipurana" where the goddess Kubjika is extolled and the manner in which she is to be worshipped is described as Kubjika

In order to understand the overall scheme of the Saivagama, we shall now briefly consider what different texts have had to say about their own location in it, and from that try to form a picture of its extent and parts. We shall begin by seeing what the Saivasiddhanta has had to say. According to the Kamikagama-the spiritual knowledge- was originally of two types, superior (para) and inferior (apara), according to the level of intelligence of those fit to comprehend it. Sivajnana, which illumines the nature of Siva, is superior while inferior is that knowledge which, starting from the Veda, illumines the nature of the fettered soul ipasu) and that which binds him {paid). These two degrees of knowledge are as different from one another as the night vision of a cat and that of a man. Saiva scripture encompasses both the superior and inferior degrees of knowledge insofar as Siva is considered to be the ultimate source of both. The higher knowledge is divided into four groups. These are, in descending order of importance: Saiva, Pasupata, Lakula and Somasiddhanta. Each is again divided into three: Right (daksina), Left (vama) and Siddhanta in such a way that the highest is Sai

vasiddhanta. According to a similar classification found in the Siddhanta manuals of South India, there are two basic categories: Siva and Saiva. These are subdivided as follows:
Siva
Vamasiva
Daksinasiva
MiSraiiva or YamaiaSiva
Siddhantaslva
Saiva
Pasupata
Somasiddhanta
Lakula

Clearly, the basic scheme consisting of four components, namely, Saiva Pasupata, Lakula and Somasiddhanta, has not changed. All that has happened is that the first of these four has been further analysed. Indeed, this basic scheme recurs frequently in the "Siddhantagamas" where it is generally integrated (as happens in the Kamikagama) into the larger scheme we shall discuss later. It appears to be one of the most basic classifications of the Saivagamic schools and so, possibly, one of the oldest. Let us therefore examine it a little more closely. Important sources for us are the commentaries on Brahmasutra 212131 which states: "For the Lord there can be no creatorship for that leads to incongruity." Commenting on this aphorism, Sankara simply refers to the Mahesvaras as those who worship Siva as the supreme God.
Vacaspati Misra (c. 850 A.D.) divides the Mahesvaras into four: Saiva, Pasupata, Kapalika and Karunika Siddhfintins." Yamunacarya (c. 1050 A D ) in his Agamaprdmanya, lists the same basic four as Saivas, Pasupatas, Kapalins and Kaltaiukhas.
Most later commentators follow this classification. Ramanuja in his commentary on the Brahmasutra lists
the same four declaring, mistakenly, that they are Pasupata sects because their followers agree that Pasupati is the instrumental cause of the universe. Kesava Kasmlrin agrees with this view, while Srlkantha correctly explains that they are all believers in the Agamas revealed by Siva, rather than just Pasupatas. We find the same set of four in the Puranas and other independent sources. Lorenzen has collected a number of references to these groups and lists them in his book, Although Lorenzen's chart is somewhat lengthy, the material it contains is sufficiently relevant to our present discussion for us to quote most of it here.