Parātrīṃśikā Vivaraṇa (Part 62): The True Meaning of “I” Beyond Body and Otherness

The large dark Mahādeva-form represents the supreme “I” is beyond both kṣara and akṣara. And the skull is a symbol of the smaller, deadened, no-longer-sovereign “I.”

Abhinava has just brought the previous movement to a peak by declaring the rise of Parābhaṭṭārikā and linking it with the disclosure of the uttama-puruṣa — the supreme “I” beyond both the perishable and the imperishable. But that climax immediately creates a serious difficulty. The moment the teaching is expressed through the word aham, an objection presses in almost automatically: in lived experience, “I” seems to refer quite plainly to embodied individuality, to the ego tied to body, mind, and limitation. So if the scripture now speaks in the first person, how can that possibly indicate the rise of the supreme Goddess rather than just the ordinary structure of self-reference?

This is why the new point begins where it does. Abhinava now has to purify the meaning of the first person itself. He must show that the true referent of asmad is not the broken, objectifiable “I” bound to body and fragments, but the self-luminous, independent, imperishable reality that remains present even when embodied egoity is secondarily designated by the same word. So the movement of this chunk is extremely exact: it begins from the scriptural claim that the supreme “I” is beyond both kṣara (perishable) and akṣara (imperishable), then faces the objection from ordinary ego-experience directly, and from there separates the real meaning of “I” from the limited forms falsely taken as self. Only on that basis can the rise of Parābhaṭṭārikā remain philosophically intact.

This movement therefore does not start a new theme. It defends the previous culmination from collapse into naïve ego-reading. It is Abhinava securing the doctrinal dignity of aham.

The supreme “I” is beyond both kṣara and akṣara

atra kṣarākṣararūpāt ubhayato'pi hi uttamatvam asmi ityasmadarthena uktam nahi

“Here, indeed, the statement ‘I am superior to both forms, the perishable and the imperishable’ has been made with reference to the meaning of asmad — the ‘I’.”

Abhinava begins by fixing the precise doctrinal stake of the previous citation. The verse about being beyond both kṣara and akṣara was not uttered vaguely, nor merely in praise of a supreme principle standing far above experience. It was spoken through asmad-artha — through the meaning of the first person, the “I.” That is the decisive point.

This matters because the prior movement had just culminated in the rise of Parābhaṭṭārikā as the disclosure of the supreme personhood. Now Abhinava makes clear that this was not an abstract metaphysical summit detached from the structure of subjectivity. The unsurpassable is being articulated precisely through the term by which selfhood is most intimately felt: aham, asmi, asmad.

That is why the next objection becomes unavoidable. The moment one hears that the supreme is being indicated through “I,” the ordinary mind immediately thinks of embodied egoity — “I stand,” “I go,” “I suffer,” “I am this person.” Abhinava knows that perfectly well. So before the objection is even fully unfolded, he first anchors the point: the verse’s claim of superiority over both the perishable and the imperishable belongs to the true meaning of the first person. The word “I” is not being abandoned to limitation. It is being reclaimed.

This is the necessary continuation from the last chunk. There, idam had already been shown to be fulfilled only in its return to reflexive awareness, then tvam emerged, and finally Parābhaṭṭārikā rose as the explicit disclosure of the supreme “I.” Here Abhinava tightens that further. The issue is no longer just that the highest can be spoken as “I,” but that the true “I” alone can bear the full weight of transcendence. Only that “I” can be said to be beyond both kṣara and akṣara.

So this first line is short, but it is not small. It plants the whole argument. The supreme is now being claimed at the level of the first person itself. Everything that follows will therefore concern a ruthless discrimination between the real meaning of “I” and its contracted imitations.

Objection from ordinary experience of “I”

nanu ahaṃ tiṣṭhāmītyatra śarīrādyahantaiva sphuṭaṃ pratīyate tatkathamatra
parābhaṭṭārikodayaḥ (?) ityata āha - nahītyādi

“But surely, in an expression like ‘I stand,’ it is precisely the egoity connected with body and the rest that is clearly experienced. So how can there be, here, the rise of Parābhaṭṭārikā? To this he replies: ‘not so,’ and so on.”

This objection is absolutely necessary. Abhinava is not arguing against a weak opponent here. He is confronting the most immediate fact of ordinary life. When someone says, “I stand,” “I go,” “I am tired,” “I suffer,” what appears first is not some luminous, supreme Śiva-nature. What appears is embodied self-reference — the felt “I” tied to posture, body, circumstance, and limitation. So the objection has real force: if the scripture speaks through aham, why should that indicate the rise of Parābhaṭṭārikā rather than the plain, familiar ego tied to bodily existence?

That is why the line says sphuṭaṃ pratīyate — it is clearly experienced. The objection does not come from abstract speculation. It comes from direct phenomenological force. One does not ordinarily feel the independent, imperishable reality first. One feels the limited “I,” the one bound to body and functions. So Abhinava cannot simply ignore this and move on with grand metaphysical language. If he does not answer this point, the whole previous culmination becomes unstable. The doctrine of the supreme “I” would collapse into confusion with common egoity.

The rise of Parābhaṭṭārikā had just been linked to the disclosure of the uttama-puruṣa, the supreme first person beyond both kṣara and akṣara. But unless the ordinary meaning of “I” is now sifted with total precision, that whole peak risks being dragged downward into the empirical self. The objection therefore functions like a test of the doctrine: can the first person really bear the weight Abhinava is placing on it?

The question tatkatham atra parābhaṭṭārikodayaḥ is sharp for this reason. It is not merely asking for verbal clarification. It is asking how the supreme Goddess can possibly “arise” in a place where what seems most obvious is bodily egoity. In plain terms: if “I” is so entangled with body-consciousness, how can it serve as the site of supreme revelation? That is the knot.

And Abhinava’s answer begins with nahītyādi — “not so,” and what follows. This is important. He does not concede the objection’s conclusion. He takes the force of the experience seriously, but he denies that the immediately felt bodily ego exhausts the meaning of aham. That is the work of the next point. The objection is granted its full vividness, but not its final authority.

So this point performs a necessary tightening. It brings the reader face to face with the fact that the first person is ambiguous. It can appear in a contracted form, tied to body and limitation, and yet still conceal a deeper referent. Abhinava will now distinguish those levels. Without this objection, that distinction would remain too easy. With it, the next move gains its full force.

The true referent of “I” and the secondary use of egoity

ayaṃ punaratra bhāvaḥ -
svatantraprakāśaghanāvinaśvaravastutattvaṃ hi paramārthaḥ tadeva svasvātantryāt
gṛhītadehāgrahaṃbhāvo'pi ahamityucyate tatprācyasvarūpānapahāratoddayotanāya |

“But the meaning here is this: the ultimate reality is the independent, compact mass of light, the imperishable essence of the real. That very reality, by its own freedom, is also spoken of as ‘I’ even when it has assumed the apprehension of body and the rest — in order to indicate that its prior essential nature has not been taken away.”

Abhinava’s reply is very exact. The true referent of aham is not the bodily ego, but the imperishable reality itself — svatantra-prakāśa-ghana, the dense mass of independent luminosity. This alone is paramārtha, the ultimate. So when the prior verse spoke in the first person and declared itself beyond both kṣara and akṣara, that first person was not meant in the ordinary contracted sense. Its proper ground is the self-luminous real.

The next move is subtle and important. Abhinava does not deny that embodied egoity too is called “I.” He explains why that usage is still possible. The same reality, through its own freedom, can take on dehāgrahaṃ-bhāva, the apprehension or appropriation of body and the rest, and even there it is still spoken of as aham. But that does not mean the body-bound ego becomes the primary meaning of “I.” It means that the prior nature has not been removed. The luminous essence remains present even in contraction. The designation persists because what speaks through the empirical “I” is not sheer otherness, but the same reality appearing under limitation.

That is the force of tatprācyasvarūpānapahāra. The original nature is not stripped away when consciousness takes up bodily self-apprehension. It is obscured, narrowed, misread perhaps — but not abolished. So the ordinary ego does not own the first person in its own right. It borrows its “I”-ness from a deeper source. The true first person belongs properly to the avinaśvara-vastutattva, the imperishable real; bodily egoity bears that name only because that deeper luminous nature still shines there, though under contraction.

This is why Abhinava’s position is stronger than both easy extremes. He does not simply identify the empirical self with the ultimate, but he also does not treat everyday self-reference as totally disconnected from truth. The ordinary “I” is neither absolute nor merely accidental. It is derivative. Its very possibility rests on the continued presence of the deeper self-luminous reality. That is what lets Abhinava preserve the dignity of aham without collapsing it into egoity. One may recall Ramana Maharshi here: in self-enquiry, the ordinary individual “I” is not treated as the final Self, but as the thread to be followed back to its source; when that ego-“I” subsides, what shines is still “I,” yet no longer the ego but the Self itself.

Body and the rest are directly non-ultimate, so they cannot truly be the referent of “asmi”

dehādestu pratyakṣameva vicchinnatāparamārthatvam iti kathaṃ tatra asmīti vyapadeśaḥ |

“But as for body and the rest, their fragmented and non-ultimate nature is directly evident. So how can the designation ‘I am’ properly apply there?”

Now Abhinava tightens the point. If the true “I” is the imperishable compact luminosity of consciousness, then body and its adjuncts cannot bear that designation in a primary sense. Why not? Because their vicchinnatā and aparamārthatva are directly evident. They are fragmented, interrupted, divisible, exposed to alteration, and therefore non-ultimate. They do not present themselves as self-established, undivided first-person reality.

The word pratyakṣam eva is important here. Abhinava is not asking the reader to abandon obvious experience in favor of some remote doctrine. He is saying that direct experience itself shows the problem. The body appears as something bounded, partite, and changeful. It is here and not there, now in one condition and later in another. It is available to cognition as something delimited. That is already enough to show that it cannot be the full referent of asmi, “I am,” if that designation is taken strictly.

So when he asks, kathaṃ tatra asmīti vyapadeśaḥ, the point is not that such language never occurs. Of course it occurs constantly: “I stand,” “I am ill,” “I am tired.” The point is that this cannot be the philosophically proper sense of the first person. The body may be designated as “I,” but only by transfer and dependence. It cannot be the true bearer of the first-person claim because what is directly manifest there is fragmentation, not uninterrupted self-luminosity.

This line is therefore a needed correction to the previous point. There Abhinava granted that bodily egoity is also called “I,” since the prior essence has not been removed. Here he prevents that concession from becoming confusion. The body and the rest are not the true subject. Their own directly evident nature disqualifies them from that role. The real referent of asmi remains the uninterrupted light of consciousness; body and its adjuncts receive that designation only secondarily, through their appropriation within that deeper awareness.

Body and the like are designated as “I” only in a limited sense

atra

sarvatra ahamiti parimitaṃ śarīrādi apadiśyate tasya pratyakṣeṇaiva tādrūpyavirodhāt |

“Here, everywhere, body and the like are designated as ‘I’ only in a limited way, since direct perception itself contradicts their being of that nature.”

Abhinava now states the same distinction in a more public and general form. Body and its adjuncts are indeed spoken of everywhere as “I” — this is undeniable. But that designation is parimita, limited, restricted, not absolute. It does not carry the full truth of the first person. The body is called “I,” but only within contraction, only within a narrowed usage that does not reach the real depth of asmad-artha.

The reason is given very clearly: pratyakṣeṇaiva tādrūpyavirodhāt. Direct perception itself contradicts the claim that body and the rest are truly of that nature. The body appears as bounded, divisible, changeful, and objectifiable. It does not appear as the uninterrupted, self-luminous, imperishable reality Abhinava has identified as the true referent of “I.” So the contradiction is not imposed from outside. It is already present in the very way the body shows itself.

That is why ordinary first-person speech must be read carefully. When one says “I stand,” “I am ill,” “I am this person,” the designation is not wholly baseless, because the deeper luminous reality has not vanished there. But neither is it exact. It is a limited attribution. The body is taken up under the sign of “I,” yet direct perception itself prevents us from identifying the body with the full truth of the first person.

So this line consolidates the previous two points. The true “I” belongs properly to the imperishable self-luminous reality. The body is also called “I,” but only in a restricted sense, because its own evident nature stands in tension with that deeper identity. Abhinava is clearing the ground very carefully: he allows ordinary usage, but refuses to let it define the real meaning of aham.]

A practical analogy may help here. When one points to a reflection in a mirror and says “that is me,” the statement is not entirely false, yet it is not exact. The reflection depends wholly on the real person and refers back to them, but it does not exhaust their reality. In the same way, body and embodied ego are designated as “I,” but only in a limited sense. They borrow that designation from the deeper self-luminous reality whose appearance they partially carry, without ever becoming its full measure.

The true form is self-manifest and Śiva-natured

tadevamīdṛśaṃ svayaṃprathātmakaṃ [svayaṃprakāśātmakaṃ na tu
nararūpaśaktirūpabhedabhedābehdatayā prakāśādhīnamityarthaḥ |] śivātmakaṃ
rūpam

“Thus, such is the form: self-manifest [that is, of the nature of self-luminosity, and not dependent for its manifestation on the differentiated, non-differentiated, or mixed forms of nara and śakti], and of the nature of Śiva.”

Having cleared away the confusion between the true first person and the body-bound “I,” Abhinava now states the positive nature of that real form. It is svayaṃprathātmaka — self-manifest, shining by itself. The gloss makes the point even plainer: svayaṃprakāśātmaka. Its manifestation does not wait upon something else. It does not become known by borrowing light from object, body, relation, or structure. It shines in and through itself.

That is why the gloss sharply adds that it is not dependent upon manifestation through the differentiated, non-differentiated, or mixed forms of nara and śakti. Those belong to articulated modes of appearing, to structured fields of relation. But this reality is not grounded in them. It is prior in the sense of being self-established. It does not need those relational formations in order to become luminous. This is not a denial that such formations may appear within it. It is a denial that they are its source.

Then Abhinava seals it with śivātmakaṃ rūpam. This form is of the nature of Śiva. That means not merely divine in a devotional sense, but the very essence of self-luminous consciousness as free, undivided, and self-revealing. At this point the argument has become very clean: the body is only secondarily called “I,” because its own evident nature is fragmented and limited. The true referent of the first person is this self-manifest Śiva-natured reality, which does not depend on objecthood, relation, or any secondary means in order to shine.

This awareness lacks nothing and exceeds nothing

ata eva bodhasyāsya svasaṃvitprathātmakasya kiṃcinna ūnaṃ nāpyadhikaṃ
[bhedābhedarūpam |]

“And for that very reason, this awareness, whose nature is the shining forth of its own consciousness, lacks nothing at all, nor does it possess anything excessive [in the form of difference or non-difference].”

Because this reality is self-manifest and Śiva-natured, Abhinava can now state its perfection in a very precise way. This bodha, whose very nature is the shining forth of its own consciousness, is neither deficient nor excessive — na kiṃcid ūnaṃ nāpy adhikam. It is not missing something that must be added from outside, nor does it carry some surplus determination imposed upon it. It is complete in its own mode of appearing.

The gloss adds an important clarification with bhedābhedarūpam. Difference, non-difference, and their mixed formulations belong to articulated ways of speaking and discriminating. But this awareness does not become more itself by acquiring them, nor is it less itself by standing prior to them. So Abhinava is not merely saying that consciousness is “full” in a vague spiritual sense. He is saying that it is not measured by relational categories at all. It is not deficient because there is no second thing it lacks; it is not excessive because no added structure can improve or complete it.

This is a strong point, because the mind usually thinks in terms of addition and subtraction. Either something is incomplete and must be supplemented, or it is swollen with attributes and relations. Abhinava cuts through both habits. The self-luminous awareness that is the true referent of “I” does not stand in need of completion, nor does it owe its richness to any superimposed field of difference and non-difference. It is complete by the very fact that it shines as its own consciousness.

tasyāprakāśarūpasya cinmaye ananupraveśāt [prakāśarūpasya
punaḥ citsvarūpe'nupraveśādityarthasiddham |] tadapekṣayā ca mādhyasthyamapi na
kiṃcit

“Because what is of the nature of non-luminosity does not enter into the conscious reality [while what is of the nature of luminosity does indeed enter into the nature of consciousness, as is thereby established], in relation to that there is no middle state at all.”

Abhinava now makes the exclusion sharper. What is aprakāśarūpa, of the nature of non-luminosity, does not truly enter into the cinmaya, the conscious reality. The gloss immediately implies the counterpart: what is of the nature of luminosity does enter into consciousness, because it belongs to it by nature. So the distinction is not arbitrary. It is grounded in affinity of being. Consciousness receives what is luminous because that is its own order; the non-luminous has no real ingress there.

That is why he adds that, in relation to this, there is no mādhyasthya, no genuine middle position. Once the issue is seen at the level of luminosity and non-luminosity, the possibility of an in-between status collapses. Something is either of the order of conscious manifestation, or it is not. Abhinava is cutting away the temptation to imagine a neutral zone between the true self-luminous subject and what is directly opposed to it. This continues the previous point very tightly: awareness is neither deficient nor excessive because it is not completed by what lies outside its own luminous nature. The non-luminous does not stand halfway inside it. It simply lacks entry.

So the argument has become very severe. The true first person is self-manifest, Śiva-natured, lacking nothing, requiring no supplement. Now Abhinava shows the consequence: what is not of the nature of luminosity cannot truly participate in that reality, and therefore no stable median category remains between the self-luminous and its contrary. That prepares the next step, where increase, decrease, and middleness will be reassigned to the levels of object, light, and “you,” while the true asmad-artha will be fixed as uninterrupted awareness.

Increase, decrease, and middleness belong only to secondary standpoints; the true asmad-meaning is uninterrupted awareness

ityupacayāpacayamadhyasthānīyedantānirdeśyābhāvalabdhapratiṣṭhānena
[upacayaḥ prakāśe apacayaḥ ghaṭe mādhyasthyaṃ yuṣmadi iti |]
tadbodhāvicchedarūpāsmadarthāḥ

“Thus, since its ground is obtained through the absence of any designable ‘thisness’ belonging to increase, decrease, or middleness [that is: increase belongs to luminosity, decrease to the pot, and middleness to the ‘you’], the meaning of asmad is of the nature of the uninterruptedness of that awareness.”

Abhinava now gathers the whole discrimination into a more exact formulation. Increase, decrease, and middleness are not marks of the true first person. The gloss distributes them very sharply: upacaya belongs to prakāśa, apacaya to the ghaṭa, and mādhyasthya to yuṣmad. These are all secondary standpoints within articulated experience. But the real asmad-artha is not established in any of them.

That is why he says its ground is found where no designable idantā, no “thisness,” remains in relation to these categories. The true “I” cannot be pointed out as one more item within the field of increase, diminution, or relational middle-standing. It is not a thing among things, nor a position between positions. It is tad-bodha-aviccheda-rūpa — of the nature of uninterrupted awareness itself. That is the decisive point. The first person in its truth is not the body, not the object, not even an intermediate pole facing a “you.” It is the unbroken continuity of consciousness.

Even “you” remains within the same luminous ground as “I”

vicchedito'pi yuṣmadartha evameveti ata eva aliṅge yuṣmadasmadī gīte |

“Even when severed, the meaning of yuṣmad (‘you’) is still just of this very kind. Therefore, in the non-gendered form, yuṣmad and asmad (‘you’ and ‘I’) are taught together.”

Abhinava now adds one final clarification. Up to this point he has been purifying the meaning of asmad, that is, the meaning of “I.” He has shown that the true “I” is not the body, not the ordinary ego in its fragmented form, but uninterrupted awareness itself. Now he says: the same must also be understood of yuṣmad, the meaning of “you.”

That is the force of vicchedito'pi — “even when severed,” even when set apart as though it were something distinct and facing me from outside. Even then, the “you” does not become an independent principle standing outside consciousness. Its apparent separateness does not give it its own self-grounded reality. The meaning of “you” remains “of this very kind,” meaning: it too depends on the same luminous field already established through the analysis of the true “I.”

So Abhinava’s point is very subtle, but actually simple. We normally feel that “I” and “you” are two fundamentally separate poles: here am I, there are you. He is saying that this split is not ultimate. The “I” and the “you” are different articulations within one conscious light. “You” appears as other, but that otherness does not create a second self-standing reality outside awareness. It is still borne by the same ground.

That is why he says ata eva — “for this very reason” — yuṣmad and asmad, “you” and “I,” are taught together. Their pairing is not just a grammatical fact. It reveals something metaphysical. The second person, “you,” cannot be understood in total isolation from the first person, “I,” because both arise within the same field of manifestation. The apparent relation between “I” and “you” is real at the level of expression, but it does not divide consciousness into two separate substances.

So this is the quiet closure of the movement. Abhinava began by defending the true dignity of “I” against reduction to bodily egoity. Then he showed that the real first person is uninterrupted awareness. Now he adds: even “you,” however separate it may seem, does not escape that same reality. The split between “I” and “you” belongs to manifestation, not to the final nature of consciousness itself.