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| Shiva and Shakti not as two separate poles, but as a nondual unity that still holds differentiated appearance within itself. The two triangles, one pointing up, one down - Shiva and Shakti side by side, say exactly that without becoming too literal. |
Abhinava now brings the long unfolding of the first verse to its final doctrinal seal. In the previous chunk, he had already shown that the shining of idam, “this,” has no independent standing: its truth lies only in vimarśa, and that vimarśa is of the essence of aham. Even ordinary object-cognition was traced back to the shining of Parameśa’s Śakti as the Self, and the false poverty of “nothing is mine” was overturned in favor of the expansive nondual fullness of “I am all.” Having carried the argument this far, Abhinava now compresses it one last time. He clarifies the sense of amā / mā, shows that even within pramāṇa-prameya transaction Parameśvara remains wholly nondual and made only of Śakti, and then states that the direct address to the Lord is in truth address to one’s own Self. This serves as the finishing seal of the first verse’s commentary. Only after that does he pause, gather the immense import of what has just been said, and turn toward the second verse, where the same secret begins to be asked for more directly as the heart-dwelling Kaulikī Śakti.
Amā: the Goddess as the state where measure, negation, and reabsorption are absent
iti | śobhanena dvaitakalaṅkāṅkanākāluṣyaleśaśṛnyena amena
paramārthopadeśādvayātmanā jñānena mānam avabodho yasya
svaprakāśaikarūpatvāt | amatīti amā a iti mā yatra avidyamānaṃ mā mānaṃ
niṣedhaśca yatra nityoditatvāt saṃhāraśca yatra nāsti sā bhagavatī amā iti ucyate |
“Thus: by that stainless ama, free even from the slightest taint or mark of the stain of duality, whose knowing is measureless because it is knowledge of the nondual nature imparted by the teaching of ultimate reality, and because it is of the single nature of self-luminosity — she is called Amā. That is, she is ‘amā’ because in her there is no mā: no measure, no negation, and, since she is eternally arisen, no reabsorption either.”
Abhinava now brings the long commentary on the first verse to an extremely compressed doctrinal close. He has already shown that the world of idam has no independent truth apart from vimarśa, that vimarśa is of the essence of aham, and that the apparent poverty of separateness must give way to the fullness of nondual self-recognition. Now he seals that entire movement in the name Amā.
The first force of the passage is negative, but not in a merely privative way. Amā is described as free from even the slightest trace of the stain of duality. That means she is not merely less divided than ordinary cognition. She is untouched by the very possibility of dual contamination. The phrase is severe because Abhinava is not leaving any room here for a subtle compromise with separateness. This is the final doctrinal tightening of the first verse.
Then he explains why she is called Amā. The play on mā is doing real work. In her there is no māna, no measure, no delimiting cognition that sets out boundaries and determinations. There is also no niṣedha, no negation. That is important. The ultimate is not reached through some final act of canceling everything into blankness. And because she is nityoditā, eternally arisen, there is no saṃhāra there either. Even reabsorption, which elsewhere functions as an important movement of return, does not apply here in the ordinary sense, because nothing has ever truly gone out from its source so as to require being brought back.
This is the real force of the name. Amā is the state in which all the structures that belong to finite articulation — measure, negation, even the very opposition between emanation and reabsorption — have already been outstripped. Not because nothing shines, but because everything is resting in nondual self-luminosity. That is why Abhinava also says her knowing is beyond measure and of the single nature of self-revelation. The ground here is not emptiness in a dry sense, but self-shining awareness beyond all delimitation.
So this point functions as the final metaphysical seal of the first verse. The whole prior discussion — hidden secret, maha-a, aham, the collapse of separate “mine,” the return of idam into self-awareness — is now compressed into this name: Amā. She is the Goddess as the state beyond measure, beyond negation, beyond even the need for reabsorption, because she is eternally and stainlessly self-luminous.
She is also Mā in another sense: the ever-risen one within whom Māyā and the whole knower-known commence take place
mā śobhanā satatoditā yatra māyāṃ pramāṇaprameyavyavahṛtau sā tādṛśī mā yasya iti
bahubrīhyantaro bahubrīhiḥ |
“She is also Mā: the beautiful, ever-risen one, within whom Māyā operates in the whole commerce of knower, means of knowledge, and object of knowledge. Thus the expression means: ‘the one whose Mā is of such a kind’ — a compound formed by an inner possessive construction within a larger possessive compound.”
Having just defined the Goddess as Amā, beyond measure, negation, and reabsorption, Abhinava now turns the same sound from another side and speaks of Mā. This is not a contradiction, but a completion. The previous point established the Goddess in her absolute purity, untouched by the slightest stain of duality. Now Abhinava shows that this very transcendence does not exclude manifestation. The same Goddess is also the ever-risen one within whom the whole field of cognition — knower, means of knowledge, and known — carries on its activity.
That is why the phrase about pramāṇa-prameya-vyavahāra matters so much. Abhinava is not speaking vaguely about illusion or worldly experience in general. He is speaking very precisely about the structured commerce of cognition itself. Even that field, with all its distinctions and transactions, unfolds within her. So the point is not merely that she transcends Māyā, but that Māyā and all cognitive differentiation have their place within her own ever-risen presence.
The word satatoditā is especially important here. She is not first absent and then somehow connected to the world later. She is always already arisen. That means manifestation does not happen outside her, nor after her, but in her and through her. The differentiated world is not a second domain standing over against the absolute. It is already included within the ever-present Goddess.
The brief grammatical note serves that same philosophical point. Abhinava is showing that this naming is not loose or accidental. The structure of the expression itself reflects containment: the apparently secondary or differentiated level is held within the larger unity. In that sense, the grammar mirrors the metaphysics.
So this point completes the previous one in the right way. Amā showed the Goddess beyond all delimitation. Mā now shows that even the world of Māyā, cognition, and differentiation unfolds within her. She is not diminished by manifestation. The whole field of knowing lives inside the ever-risen one.
Even within the whole commerce of knower, means, and known, Parameśvara remains nothing but Paraśakti and wholly nondual
parameśvaro hi pramāṇādivyavahāre'pi paraśaktimaya eva
sarvathā advaitarūpatvāt tasya āmantraṇamātmana eva || 1 ||
“For Parameśvara, even within the whole commerce of means of knowledge and the rest, is nothing but Paraśakti alone, since he is in every way of the nature of nonduality. Therefore the direct address to him is in truth address to one’s own Self.”
Abhinava now gives the final seal to the whole long commentary on the first verse. In the previous two points, he first defined the Goddess as Amā, beyond measure, negation, and reabsorption, and then as Mā, the ever-risen one within whom even the differentiated field of cognition unfolds. Now he states the doctrinal conclusion that makes those two sides hold together without contradiction: even in the midst of the full transactional field of pramāṇa, prameya, and all the rest, Parameśvara is nothing but Paraśakti.
This is the crucial point. The differentiated commerce of cognition does not force Abhinava into dualism. He does not say: at the highest level there is Śakti, but down here in pramāṇa-prameya there is some second-order, partly independent domain. No. Even there, even in the entire articulated field of knowledge and objecthood, Parameśvara remains paraśaktimaya eva — made of Paraśakti alone. Manifestation does not create a second ontology.
That is why he immediately adds sarvathā advaitarūpatvāt — because he is in every respect of the nature of nonduality. This line matters because it rules out compromise. Nonduality is not preserved only in some hidden interior while the world of cognitive transaction belongs to another order. The nondual remains true through all of it. The whole commerce of cognition is still taking place within Śakti.
From there the final sentence follows naturally: tasya āmantraṇam ātmana eva — the direct address to him is in truth address to one’s own Self. This now gathers together the earlier reflection on vocative force and gives its ultimate basis. The address “O Lord” is not merely relational piety aimed at an external divinity. Since Parameśvara is nondual and nothing but Paraśakti even in the differentiated field, to address him is in truth to address one’s own deepest Self.
So this line closes the first verse with real force. The whole long movement — from the secret a, to maha-a, to aham, to the collapse of separate “mine,” to Amā and Mā — ends here. The Lord is not elsewhere. Even in the midst of manifestation and cognition, he remains wholly nondual Śakti. Therefore invocation is already inward recognition.
What has just been said is a summary of the infinite import of the half-verse just explained
idameva sārdhaślokanirūpitānantapraśnatātparyasaṃgraheṇa etaduktaṃ bhavati iti
nirṇetuṃ nirūpyate
“And this is what is meant when the infinite purport of the half-verse just expounded is gathered into summary; in order to determine that, it is now set forth.”
Abhinava now pauses and says, in effect, that everything just unfolded is only a gathered summary of the immense intention contained in the preceding half-verse. That is not rhetorical inflation. By this point, the reader has already watched one half-verse open into a whole doctrinal universe: Māyā and Vidyā, the great cave, Śakti, mantra, visarga, aham, and the collapse of separateness. So when Abhinava says that what has been said is only a saṃgraha, a compressed gathering of its infinite purport, one is forced to admit that he is not bluffing. There is even something slightly brutal — and, at this point, almost funny — in the scale of it: more than fifty parts of commentary, and we are still only bringing the first verse to a close, with roughly one fifth of the Vivarana covered. A normal author would have finished a small book by now. Abhinava is still summarizing the half-verse. But that is exactly the point. The verse was never “small.” It only looked small from a distance.
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