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rather more philosophically oriented than the more yogically and/or mystically inclined SpKā and ŚSū, while being simultaneously more theologically oriented and colored by scripture than the ĪPK. Yet one would be hard-pressed to describe the ŚD as a work of systematic theology, as the text is synthetic in nature, drawing from numerous streams of thought. More important, it does not articulate a philosophy that corresponds, even loosely, to a single scriptural vision, as one would expect of a systematic theology. It rather constructs a unique philosophical vision, if not de novo then with a largely indirect and thus circumscribed contact with the scriptural sources (though it must hastily be added that the work owes a great deal to the Trika VBh, as indicated above and as will be discussed below).

Defined as it is here in relation to the various other post-scriptural writings, and in relation to the ĪPK and ĪPVṛ in particular, it is therefore most appropriate to describe the ŚD as a sort of philosophical theology that is based on what is, overall, an admittedly indeterminate body of scriptural sources.35 The ŚD addresses philosophical issues, as the very title of the work suggests,36 yet it does not shy away from the theological register. And Somānanda is concerned at least occasionally to show that his philosophy accords with the declarations of scripture.37 At the same time, it is clearly not what we might call a work of yoga philosophy, as both the SpKā and the ŚSū might be labeled, because it is rather more inclined to engage epistemological and ontological questions than to address matters associated with mystical or other cultivated forms of experience.

Although this, or any, label is of limited analytical value, it is important to recognize the rather wide range of qualities, preferences, and apparent authorial strategies that may be identified in the diverse body of Śaiva post-scriptural literature. In doing so, what becomes apparent is that the ŚD was probably intended for a philosophically oriented audience, but one that was primarily made up tantric initiates, or for potential initiates who would be predisposed to the scriptural tone and high, if mixed, register of the work. This supposition is confirmed by Utpaladeva, who tells the reader in the opening verses to his ŚDVṛ

35This lack of defined contact with scripture precludes any classification of the work as one of exegesis, in my view, as it is difficult to determine the body of literature on which Somānanda would be said to have based his ideas. The one clear exception to the otherwise vague appearance of scripture in the ŚD is the extensive contact with the VBh that is exhibited in the text, as will be discussed below. If one were to choose to define the ŚD as a work of eisegesis, it is likely one would have to do so with respect to this text.

36Chatterji [1914] 1986: 144–145 has suggested that one should understand the title of the work, Śivadṛṣṭi, to refer to a Śaiva darśana or philosophy. It is also possible that the title should be understood (as a genitive tatpuruṣa compound) to refer to the “seeing” or even the “mind’s eye” of Śiva, referring to the process of cognition that is described in the text as belonging equally to Śiva, the creator of the universe, and to the apparently individual and limited agents who populate that universe as microcosmic forms of Śiva himself. See “Somānanda’s ‘Settled Opinion’ (siddhānta),” below (section 5), for a further discussion of the philosophy of the ŚD.

37See, e.g., ŚD 3.63–68ab and ŚD 3.95cd–96ab.

that he wrote the work at the behest of his son and his fellow student, though the details discussed therein were already explained in his ĪPK and ĪPVṛ, a statement that stands in direct contrast to the opening verse of the ĪPK, where Utpaladeva suggests he wrote the work in order to help “all people” achieve the same state of elevated awareness as he did.38

Finally, a last piece of evidence supporting the notion that the ŚD was intended for an audience of initiates is found in the way the text deals with the various orthodox Brahminical schools of thought. The arguments against these schools are often given in a telegraphic and doxographical form, and as such the ŚD treats most of the orthodox schools serially and only briefly. It wishes only to show that none of the orthodox schools sufficiently account for the unity of all existence. The tone and style of these passages, then, read something like notes for the insider, rather than the sustained and rather more nuanced analysis one would expect for a work that in any way was intended to convert the outsider to the author’s point of view.39

One may therefore speculate that Somānanda wished to communicate his particular philosophical insights to those who wished to interrogate and synthesize the ideas that their own scriptural sources evoked. The ŚD simultaneously helped the same audience to develop a greater appreciation of the potential objections that other tantric (and, perhaps, nontantric) practitioners might raise against their own view, as it helped to equip them to respond to such challenges. (One must note, however, that no tantric or nontantric critiques of the ŚD may be found in the extant primary literature.) It further seems unlikely that those who would have studied the ŚD would have readily offered Somānanda’s text to the wider community of learned Brahmins, be they members of the court’s inner circle or otherwise, initiates in the dualist Śaiva Siddhānta or merely adherents of the more orthodox schools of Brahminical thought, either in an attempt to curry favor among the Kashmiri elite or to cultivate respectability for their particular brand of tantrism.

4. Somānanda’s Biography and Autobiography

If Somānanda was not particularly interested in reaching the noninitiate, this should not be taken to suggest that he was not a person of standing in the elite and learned social circles often associated with the royal court. Indeed, Somānanda seems to have been recognized as a person of significance by the king, as he is referred to by the royally conferred title Bhaṭṭaśrī in Utpaladeva’s

38See ĪPK 1.1.1 and the commentary thereon. Utpaladeva refers to his desire to help all people with janasyāpy upakāram icchan, the particle (api) serving to emphasize the inclusiveness of the collective singular noun jana, as the commentary indicates by glossing with imam akhilaṃ.

39This is an approach that stands in direct contrast to the ĪPK and ĪPVṛ, which were clearly written with the intent of winning over a wider audience.

auto-commentary on the ĪPK.40 Some concern for, or perhaps even intimacy with, the goings on of the royal court also appears within the verses of the ŚD itself, where Somānanda invokes the king as an example of a sovereign possessed of an unrestrained will. It must be cautioned, however, that the king is not always presented in an entirely positive light in the ŚD, as he is in one place held responsible for surreptitiously alloying gold coins that are then circulated at an overpriced value, a practice that, intriguingly, very likely took place in Kashmir in Somānanda’s day.41 On the basis of this admittedly sparse evidence, then, one may surmise that Somānanda was close to the court but was not particularly enamored by it. And if this is so, it would be for good reason, for if the Rājataraṅginī (RT) is any guide to historical realities, the Kashmir Valley of the period in question was one of extreme political turmoil, as “the kings at that time could nohow secure a long reign, and resembled the bubbles produced [in the water] by a downpour of rain on a dull day,” as Kalhaṇa described it.42

Another noteworthy resource for contextualizing the author’s work is an autobiographical passage, supposedly written by Somānanda himself and appended to the ŚD. While it is both rather short and somewhat lacking of historical detail, the passage nevertheless reveals at least something of the author’s place in the world. It is suggested there that Somānanda was a Brahmin whose great-great- grandfather, Saṃgamāditya, was the first in his family line to settle in Kashmir. The passage also reflects the Śaiva orientation of the author, for the Tryambaka mentioned in the text as the founder of Somānanda’s familial lineage is

40See ĪPVṛ ad ĪPK 4.16. One may know that the title is royally conferred by the fact that Jayanta Bhaṭṭa’s contemporaneously set play, the Āgamaḍambara, illustrates it as such. See Sanderson 20071: 241, fn. 33.

41Reference to the king who alloys gold coins is made on ŚD 4.10-11ab. It is noteworthy that this sort of behavior was shunned in the RT (5.171–176), though reference there is to the skewing of the weights of scales by Śaṅkaravarman (r. 883–902), not to the alloying of coins. Cunningham (1967: 29; cf. pp. 36–37), however, notes the existence of gold coins of the Kārkoṭa dynasty (from c. 760–780 C.E.) that were so heavily alloyed with silver “as to make it difficult to say whether the pieces contain any gold at all,” and it is likely that such coins remained in circulation even to Somānanda’s day, about which see, again, Cunningham (ibid.). Other passages in the ŚD that mention the king are as follows: ŚD 4.4–5 suggests that the king, in a manner analogous to Śiva, exemplifies the master who controls subordinated, yet nevertheless semi-autonomous, agents. ŚD 1.37cd–38, suggests that the king who chooses the difficult life of the foot-soldier for his own amusement may serve as an analogy for Śiva, who for his own amusement assumes the form even of those sinners who suffer their punishment in hell.

42See RT 5.279: prāpuś ciram avasthānaṃ pārthivā na tadā kvacit / dhārāsaṃpātasaṃbhūtā budbudā iva durdine. The translation here is Stein’s. Though Kashmir was witness to real stability under the wellregarded king Avantivarman (855/6-883) in a period that likely predates Somānanda by a few decades, the Valley was subsequently ruled by Śaṅkaravarman (883–902), described by the RT as a corrupt and powerful king. (Jayanta Bhaṭṭa, however, had some kinder words for his patron, about which see Dezső 2005: 15–19, 145, and 151.) This was followed by the period of severe political turmoil and wrangling for the throne just mentioned (902–939), when the royal throne changed hands no fewer than twelve times, though this was followed by a short period of the “mild rule” (939–948), as Stein [1892] 1989 (vol. 1): 103 described it, of King Yaśaskara. See RT 5.219ff. I am thankful to an anonymous reviewer of the present volume for the reference to Dezső’s Much Ado About Religion.

the same as the one who is mentioned in Jayaratha’s commentary on Abhinavagupta’s Tantrāloka (TĀ), the Tantrālokaviveka (TĀV), as the keeper of the teachings of the Trika.43 That the text also links Somānanda’s family to the irascible and imprecating sage Durvāsas further suggests a thoroughly Śaiva context.44

One may note that, if this autobiographical passage may indeed be attributed to Somānanda and identified as the last part of the ŚD,45 then it would be a rather early example of the autobiographical genre in Indian literary history, for while we have autobiographical passages from the authors of various prose poems who wrote prior to Somānanda,46 we have to my knowledge none, prior to the present one, from any author purported to be an enlightened being, whether a renunciant or a householder. (The author’s name, Somānanda, must be an initiation name or dīkṣānāma, not a given name.) Of course, to include such

43Note that Dyczkowski 1987: 18 and Torella 1994: xiv have made similar observations regarding the Śaiva nature of the passage in question. That a Tryambaka is also mentioned in a number of Trika sources, such as the Tantrasadbhāvatantra (TST) (10.302c and 25.62b), for example, adds further support to the notion that this reference points to Somānanda’s links with the Trika tantras. Cf. TĀV vol 1., p. 28, and TĀ 36.12, both also quoted in Torella (1994: xiv, fn. 11).

44See Dyczkowski 1987: 228–229, fn. 68.

45The passage is found in verses 7.107–123ab of the KSTS edition of the ŚD, but the following four reasons lead one at least to suspect that the material should be counted as an addendum to, rather than the culmination of, that text. (1) First of all, that the passage appears in the published edition following what appears to be a culminating verse of the text, written in Mālinī meter and counted as ŚD 7.106 in the published edition, gives prima facie evidence that the autobiographical passage is an addendum to the ŚD. (2) Second, the only manuscript source I have of the text of the autobiography, the Berlin Manuscript from the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, manuscript number Ms/fol 910a, suggests that the autobiographical passage in question, the only passage found in the manuscript in question, is part of a certain Śivadṛṣṭivivṛti and not the ŚD itself. (3) Third, the only complete manuscript in my possession of the ŚD, the manuscript of Calcutta Sanskrit College (C in the critical edition of ŚD 1–3 included in the present volume), does not record the autobiographical passage. C ends with what is counted as ŚD 7.106ab, followed by the colophon. (4) Finally, in referring to a vernacular form of the title of Somānanda’s lineage (ŚD 7.121c), the text invokes a practice—precisely this reference to the vernacular—that is not seen elsewhere in Pratyabhijñā writings before the time of Abhinavagupta.

It is possible that the identification of the present passage with a portion of the text of a “Śivadṛṣṭivivṛti” refers to an auto-commentary on the ŚD composed (of course) by Somānanda himself. This is precisely the conclusion that Chatterji apparently reached some time ago. Pandey, too, suggests that such a work was composed by our Somānanda. Evidence for the existence of this auto-commentary, however, is to my knowledge limited to the references in the manuscript sources to the present autobiography as belonging to what is called the Vṛtti or Vivṛti. It is my opinion that the present text is not only an addition to Somānanda’s text, but one that is rather more likely to have come from the pen of one of Somānanda’s disciples than from the author of the ŚD himself. On the other hand, it seems unlikely that the (rather general and limited) historical data offered in this text—that Somānanda was a Brahmin whose great-great-grandfather immigrated to Kashmir, etc.—were invented, but only were likely to have been reported by another than Somānanda himself. See note 25, above, for the relevant references and for a discussion of the existence of this auto-commentary.

46This includes both the “true” stories (the Ākhyāyikās) and the “fictive” stories (the Kathās) written in prose. See Lienhard 1984: 228–264, esp. 250 and 260. The earliest known autobiography is that of Bāṇa, court poet of King Harṣa (606–647 C.E.), found in the opening chapter (ucchvāsa) of his

Harṣacarita.

autobiographical information, however scant, squares perfectly well with the idea of the author as a Siddha descended to earth in order to propagate the secrets of the enlightened ones among those ready to hear them. As the autobiography, often mentioned in the secondary literature,47 has yet to appear in translation, I include it here, as follows.48

47See: Chatterji [1914] 1986: 150–153; Pandey [1963] 2000: 135–137; Dyczkowski 1987: 18; Dyczkowski 19921: 42; Torella 1994: xiv.

48As mentioned (see note 45, above), the present text is counted as ŚD 7.107–123b in the KSTS edition (a numbering of verses preserved, for convenience’s sake, in the edition here included). Other than the Srinagar manuscript used for the KSTS edition, only one other manuscript exists, to my knowledge, of the passage in question, one that is held in the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin. Thus, I have collated the readings of this manuscript, along with both those of the KSTS edition of the ŚD and those appearing in the KSTS edition of Jayaratha’s TĀV, as follows:

B = Berlin Manuscript. Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, manuscript number Ms/fol 910a. This is a paper manuscript written in śāradā script. I am unsure of its measurements as I have only seen a photocopy of reduced size. It records 17 lines per page, 17–19 characters per line. Numbering two folios in length, it includes ŚD 7.107–123ab. The maṅgala and opening passage of the MS read: oṃ. mayā gurucaraṇasamārādhanenaivaṃ kila śrūyate. yad uktaṃ śivadṛṣṭivivṛtau. The manuscript appears to be in very good condition, and its readings are generally correct. Ked. = KSTS edition of ŚD. See Madhusudan Kaul, ed., Śivadṛṣṭi (KSTS no. 54), Pune: Aryabhushan Press, 1934. T = KSTS edition of Jayaratha’s TĀV ad TĀ

1.8.See R. C. Dwivedi and Navajivan Rastogi, eds., The Tantrāloka of Abhinavagupta, with the Commentary of Jayaratha, 2nd ed., vol. 2 (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1987), 27–28.

7.107. śaivādīni rahasyāni pūrvam āsan mahātmanām(BKed.; mahātmanā T) / ṛṣīṇāṃ vaktrakuhare teṣv evānugrahakriyā. 7.108. kalau pravṛtte yāteṣu teṣu durgamagocaram(BT; durgamagocare Ked.) / kalāpigrāmapramukham(BT; kalāpigrāmapramukhe Ked.) ucchinne śivaśāsane(BT; samucchinne ca śāsane Ked.). 7.109. kailāsādau bhraman devo mūrtyā śrīkaṇṭharūpayā / anugrahāyāvatīrṇaś codayām āsa bhūtale. 7.110. muniṃ durvāsasaṃ nāma bhagavān ūrdhvaretasam(Ked.T; uvvaretasaṃ B) / nocchidyate(em.; na cchidyate B, nocchidyeta Ked., ucchidyate T) yathā śāstraṃ rahasyaṃ kuru tādṛśam. 7.111. tataḥ sa bhagavān devād ādeśaṃ prāpya yatnataḥ(BT; yatnavān Ked.) / sasarja mānasaṃ putraṃ tryambakādityanāmakam. 7.112. tasmin(Ked.T; tasmiṃn B) saṃkramayām āsa rahasyāni samantataḥ / so ’pi gatvā guhāṃ samyak tryambakākhyāṃ(Ked.T; tryambakākhyaṃ B) tataḥ param. 7.113. (B includes the following half-verse prior to 7.113ab: jñānam adyāsakāṣṭhāṃ tannītavāṃs tadguhāntare.) tannāmnā(Ked.T; tatrāmrā B) cihnitaṃ(Ked.T; cihnitām B) tatra sasarja manasā sutam(Ked.T; āpi guhākhyā tatra bhūtale B) / (B includes the following half-verse prior to 7.113cd: sa tatra jñānasaṃsiddhā sasarja manasā sutam.) kham utpapāta saṃsiddhas tatputro ’pi tathā(Ked.T; yathā B) tathā. 7.114. siddhas(Ked.T; siddhās B) tadvat sutotpattyā siddhā evaṃ(Ked.T; eva B) caturdaśa / yāvat pañcadaśaḥ putraḥ sarvaśāstraviśāradaḥ. (7.115–117 are omitted from B, which includes the following prior to its reading of verse 7.118: sa kadācid rāgavaśāt kutaścid brahmaṇā svayam) 7.115. sa kadācil lokayātrām āsīnaḥ prekṣate tataḥ / bahir mukhasya tasyātha brāhmaṇī kācid eva hi. 7.116. rūpayauvanasaubhāgyabandhurā sā gatā dṛśam / dṛṣṭvā tāṃ lakṣaṇair yuktāṃ yogyāṃ kanyām athātmanaḥ. 7.117. sadharmacāriṇīṃ samyag gatvā tatpitaraṃ svayam / arthayitvā brāhmaṇīṃ tām ānayām āsa yatnataḥ. 7.118. brāhmaṇena vivāhena(Ked.T; brahmaṇīm ānayāmāsa B) tato jātas(Ked.T; jñātam B) tathāvidhaḥ / tena(Ked.T; tana B) yaḥ sa ca kālena kaśmīreṣv āgato bhraman. 7.119. nāmnā sa saṃgamādityo(Ked.T; samaṇgamādityo Bp.c., samaṇgamādyityo Ba.c.) varṣādityo ’pi tatsutaḥ(Ked.T; tatatsutaḥ B) / tasyāpy(Bp.c.Ked.T; tasyāpyi Ba.c.) abhūt sa bhagavān aruṇādityasaṃjñakaḥ(Ked.T;saṃkakaḥ B). 7.120. ānandasaṃjñakas tasmād udbabhūva(Ked.T; sa babhūva B) tathāvidhaḥ / tasmād asmi samudbhūtaḥ somānandākhya īdṛśaḥ. (7.121–123 are omitted from B, which instead reads: ādau manaso jñāto durvāsatryambakādityaḥ / kramaśas tatkulajñātās sadgāmavarṣāruṇānandaḥ. tasmāt somānandana gurur iti kuśalaḥ prabodhavān jñataḥ.) 7.121. karomi sma prakaraṇaṃ śivadṛṣṭyabhidhānakam / evam eṣā(em. [Chaturvedi]; eṣāṃ TKed.) tryambakākhyā terambā deśabhāṣayā. 7.122. sthitā śiṣyapraśiṣyādair vistīrṇā maṭhikoditā / tad evam etad vihitaṃ mayā prakaraṇaṃ manāk. 7.123. prārthyante ’smin prayukte ’pi guravo grahaṇaṃ prati.

The Author’s Thought and the Intellectual

History of the Pratyabhijñā

5. Somānanda’s “Settled Opinion” (siddha¯nta)

The foundation of Somānanda’s philosophical theology rests with the idea that Śiva is not a passive, transcendent, and inaccessible deity, but rather is fully engaged in manifesting all the appearances and activities that constitute the very existence of the universe. Śiva acts by initiating a cycle of his powers, will (icchā), cognition (jñāna), and action (kriyā), one that spins out all action and all reality. At the same time, the powers exist in a unified or nonsequential state when Śiva is in his apparently quiescent mode (ŚD 1.3–4).

The basis of this idea rests on the notion that all action necessarily involves agency: nothing is accomplished and nothing appears in the absence of the agent who chooses to engage in some activity; and action begins with the very will or desire (icchā) to accomplish the act in question. Śiva, then, is the embodiment of the power of will,54 which leads to any and every cognition or action.55 It is will (icchā) that directs both the creation (ŚD 3.33cd–34) and the appearance of the form of the universe (ŚD 3.42cd–47). The power of will creates the distinction between unity and multiplicity (ŚD 3.35–36ab), just as it causes beings to be cognizant or ignorant of their inherent freedom (ŚD 3.72); and by Śiva willing it even the teacher, the teachings, and the student who benefits from both come into existence (ŚD 3.73–76ab).

54He is described as icchāśaktimaya by Utpaladeva on ŚDVṛ ad ŚD 2.1.

55Thus, Utpaladeva explains the meaning of ŚD 1.19ab—“since he desires to know or to act, the activity is by means of will” (yata icchati taj jñātuṃ kartuṃ vā secchayā kriyā)—as follows: “since it is said that the Lord desires either to know or to act, [Somānanda] expresses the verbal form of it as ‘activity by means of will,’ i.e., activity in the form of will” (yasmād icchatīśvaro jñātuṃ vā kartuṃ veti yad ucyate, tadākhyātapadam icchayecchālakṣaṇāṃ kriyām āha). In other words, since it is said that Śiva wishes to know or act, to do either implies a preceding action of desire.

What is more, Somānanda understands all agents ultimately to be none other than Śiva himself, whether he exists in his apparently quiescent form, as a being consisting of pure power, as one of the many agents appearing in the world, or even as those beings who are condemned to suffer in hell (ŚD 1.39–43; cf. 1.29cd–33, 1.34, and 1.35). Just as a king engages in the duties of a foot-soldier as a game, he says, so also does Śiva engage the activities of the limited agents of the world (ŚD 1.37cd–38); and the cognitive understanding that any agent acquires is similarly linked to Śiva’s nature as pure consciousness (ŚD 1.26–29ab; cf. the Vṛtti on the same). The same Śiva who creates the universe, then, may be identified with the individual, apparently limited agents who populate it (ŚD 1.1, 1.2, 1.34), because the same powers that Śiva employs to manifest all of creation (ŚD 1.20cd–21) also operate in the same sequence in any individual action or cognition (ŚD 1.22; cf. ŚD 1.6cd–7ab). And just as Śiva knows a sort of quiescent condition, so too do the powers come to rest (viśrānti) in the moments prior to and following the mundane cognitions of any and every of the apparently limited agents found in the universe (ŚD 1.5–6ab). Simply, all action stems from the divine impulse to perform an action or cognition, and this impulse, like the other powers, belongs to none other than the one Śiva. Indeed, all entities exist in all other entities, this insofar as everything is equally possessed of the same Śiva-nature (ŚD 5.105–110).

Activity, then, is in Somānanda’s view always of a single kind, namely, that of the yogin in concentration. All that is manifested, and all cognition and action, is the product of the will of Śiva the yogin, who effects the changes seen in the world instantaneously, merely by imagining things to be thus (ŚD 1.44–45ab; 3.36c–37c; cf. ŚD 5.91–93). Simply, Śiva is consciousness itself (ŚD 1.39a), which is all-pervasive,56 and Śiva and the universe are one and the same entity (ŚD 1.48ab, 1.49). The one can no more be separated from the other than a power can be separated from the agent who possesses it,57 just as an object cannot be separated from the action it performs (ŚD 6.1). As such, Śiva, the individual, and the entities found in the world are all equally Śiva himself.58 To put it in the language of the Trika, the tantric scriptural tradition that most influenced Somānanda, Śiva, his powers, and the individualized forms of consciousness are all one.59 The universe as it is known through one’s everyday, sensory experience is therefore absolutely real (ŚD 4.6cd–7ab; cf. ŚD 4.29), this insofar as it is the very form of Śiva’s consciousness (see ŚD 5.3cd and 5.12; cf., e.g., ŚD 3.63–68ab).

56The proof of this is provided in the fourth chapter of the ŚD. See ŚD 4.1ab: athedānīṃ pravaktavyaṃ yathā sarvaṃ śivātmakam. See also ŚD 3.17: tasmāt samagrākāreṣu sarvāsu pratipattiṣu / vijñeyaṃ śivarūpatvaṃ svaśaktyāveśanātmakam. Cf. ŚD 1.46cd–47.

57See also ŚD 3.18ab: svātmaniṣṭhe śivatā deve pṛthivyādāv apīḍrśam.

58I put the view in these terms, even if Somānanda does not quite say as much, to indicate the diametric opposition of this view to that of the dualist Śaiva Siddhānta, whose dualism is defined by the very distinction here denied, namely the mutual distinction of God, the individual, and the various material entities found in the world.

59See Sanderson 1990: 56.

And the change in the condition of Śiva’s consciousness in the moment of manifestation does nothing to change its fundamental nature, just as the condition of milk changes as it falls from the cow’s udder without becoming something other than itself (ŚD 1.18). Everything is created instantaneously and in a manner that is indistinguishable from Śiva’s very consciousness, and therefore all action is nothing but consciousness performing as Śiva wills it.

The degree to which the ŚD presents a philosophy of radical agency therefore cannot be overstated. Indeed, Somānanda’s understanding of the agent’s will—and its nature as the root cause of all action—is more developed, nuanced, and emphasized in the ŚD than it is by Utpaladeva in the ĪPK and ĪPVṛ (or elsewhere, for that matter). This is so because Somānanda is unique in identifying an initial moment of will, aunmukhya or “eagerness,” that stirs the moment Śiva begins to desire to create experience in the form of phenomena appearing in his consciousness (ŚD 1.7cd–8). This first stirring of will, this eagerness, is a sort of sudden excitement that occurs in an instant (tuṭi), and it initiates the process of creation. As such, it may be experienced in the first moment of an action, as one can see it in the moment of tension in the hand about to close into a fist, in still water just prior to its stirring into waves, and so on (ŚD 1.13cd–17). It may also be perceived, for example, upon hearing good news, in the moment one senses danger, and the like—in other words in heightened moments of experience (ŚD 1.9–11ab).

Insofar as will (icchā) has two parts, the initial moment in the form of eagerness (aunmukhya), and a subsequent, fully formed manifestation of will (icchā), it is considered to be an action (ŚDVṛ ad ŚD 1.19–20ab), one that Somānanda suggests is performed entirely within the movement of consciousness (ŚD 1.25d). This is to say that Somānanda defines will as an action on the basis of the grammarians’ famous definition thereof, which suggests that action must involve the occurrence of a sequence of related activities that are conceived of as being ordered toward a single end.60 Behind will, in turn, lies another power, according to Somānanda, that of “delight” (nirvṛti), the very nature of Śiva’s consciousness (ŚD 1.2). Śiva, one must recall, acts only out of his own desire to enjoy, to play (ŚD 1.36a), and not for any particular purpose. He acts as he does only because it is his nature to do so (ŚD 1.11cd–13ab), and the only telos Śiva pursues in engaging action is his own delight. (Indeed, Utpaladeva goes so far as to define play as the vibration of Śiva’s consciousness in pursuit of joy).61 Thus, to engage in the world—that which is “reviled,” says Somānanda, referring to

60Kaul 1934, quoting Bhartṛhari’s famous definition of action found at VP 3.8.4, suggests that Somānanda borrows this concept from that author. While this is possible, it is not necessarily so, as awareness of Patañjali’s definition of action would suffice to inform Somānanda’s position. See note 164 to chapter 1 of the translation, below.

61See ŚD 1.36–38 and in particular the ŚDVṛ ad ŚD 1.37cd–38, wherein Utpaladeva offers the following: harṣānusārī spandaḥ krīḍā.