Verse 1 (text and translation)

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of verse 1:

तन् महः परमं नौमि कृत्यैः पञ्चभिर् अङ्कितम् ।
अशेषविश्वाभेदात्म पूर्णाहन्तात्मकं शिवम् ॥ १ ॥

tan mahaḥ paramaṃ naumi kṛtyaiḥ pañcabhir aṅkitam |
aśeṣaviśvābhedātma pūrṇāhantātmakaṃ śivam || 1 ||

I offer salutations to that extraordinary illuminating power adorned by the five cosmic acts, whose non-dual essence encompasses the universe—Śiva, the all-embracing identity.

Notes:

In his opening verse of the Saubhāgyahṛdayastotra, Śivānanda praises Śiva as mahas (illuminating power), referring to his supreme ‘all-embracing identity’ that pervades all of reality as pure consciousness. This verse is clearly influenced by the Pratyabhijñā philosophy of Śaiva nondualism, which was the first system of Indic thought to comprehensively develop, articulate, and expound the doctrine that the Self, as the universal subjective experience of “I” (ahaṃbhāva), alone exists.^[1]

Although the doctrine of the Self can be found in a number of significant Upaniṣads and their commentaries by important figures such as Śaṅkarācārya, the experience of the Self according to the Pratyabhijñā tradition differs substantially from these earlier traditions.^[2] Perhaps most notable is that within Pratyabhijñā, the individual ego doesn't dissolve away as the product of mistaken knowledge (avidyā) about an illusory world (māyā). Rather, the individual ego is universalized as the single supreme ego, revealed as Śiva. This singular consciousness not only pervades the entirety of creation, but imagines and creatively enacts the universe—something the attribute-less, creator-less, and immutable Advaita Vedāntic conception of ultimate reality cannot do.

Śivānanda further characterizes Śiva by his performance of five actions (pañcakṛtya) that structure the experience of reality consisting of sṛṣṭi (emanation), sthiti (preservation), saṃhāra (dissolution), tirodhāna (concealing), and anugraha (revealing). The Lalitāsahasranāma teaches that Tripurasundarī is “pañcakṛtyaparāyaṇa” the one performs, and is devoted to, these same five actions.^[3] Bhāskararāya mentions in his Saubhāgyabhāskara commentary on the Lalitāsahasranāma that the meaning of this name can be found in the Pratyabhijñāhṛdaya^[4] —yet another instance where important teachers from within the Śrīvidyā tradition point to works from Kashmir to help illuminate their tradition. Śiva's five acts, as well as their correlation with the four cardinal directions (plus an upper direction) and the pañcamahābhūtas (five great elements) are given in the Kālottaratantra as follows:^[5]

Face of Sadāśiva	Action	Direction	Element
Sadyojāta	sṛṣṭi	west	pṛthvī (earth)
Vāmadeva	sthiti	north	jala (water)
Aghora	saṃhāra	south	agni (fire)
Tatpuruṣa	tirodhāna	east	vāyu (air)
Īśāna	anugraha	upper	ākāśa (space)

Śivānanda was greatly influenced by teachings of the great Śaiva masters from Kashmir including Abhinavagupta, whom he cites numerous times in his Ṛjuvimarśinī commentary on the Nityāṣoḍaśikārṇavatantra. Abhinavagupta, in his^[6]

Īśvarapratyabhijñāvimarśinī on Īśvarapratyabhijñākārikā 1.1.5, teaches about the single supreme all-knowing subject (Śiva) as follows:

परत्वं केवलम् उपाधेर् देहादेः स चापि विचारितो यावन् नान्य इति विश्वः प्रमातृवर्गः परमार्थत एकः प्रमाता स एव चास्ति । तद् उक्तं प्रकाश एवास्ति स्वात्मनः स्वपरात्मभिर् इति । ततश् च भगवान् सदाशिवो जानातीत्य् अतः प्रभृति क्रिमिर् अपो जानातीत्य् अन्तम् एक एव प्रमाता ॥

paratvaṃ kevalam upādher dehādeḥ sa cāpi vicārito yāvan nānya iti viśvaḥ pramātṛvargaḥ paramārthata ekaḥ pramātā sa eva cāsti | tad uktaṃ prakāśa evāsti svātmanaḥ svaparātmabhir iti | tataś ca bhagavān sadāśivo jānātīty ataḥ prabhṛti krimir apo jānātīty antam eka eva pramātā ||

“Otherness (paratva) only comes from limiting conditions (upādhi) such as the body, and these [limiting conditions themselves], as soon as they are investigated, [turn out] not [to be] different [from the universal self]; therefore the entire multiplicity of the subject is in reality one single subject (ekaḥ pramātā), and this [subject] alone exists. This has been said [by Utpaladeva]: “Only conscious light (prakāśa) exists by itself, as oneself as well as the self of others”. And therefore, from “The Lord Sadāśiva knows” to “even a worm knows”, it is one single subject [who knows].”^[7]

Footnotes and references:

[back to top]

[1]:

Dyczkowski 2004, 29-49.

[2]:

For a preliminary study on the differences between Advaita-Vedānta and the Pratyabhijñā of Kashmir see Singh 1985.

[3]:

Pañcakṛtyaparāyaṇa is the 274th name in the Lalitāsahasranāma. See Paṇśikar 1935, 80.

[4]:

The Pratyabhijñahṛdaya is a concise work by Kṣemarāja, a disciple of Abhinavagupta. Bhāskararāya writes: etad arthaḥ pratyabhijñāhṛdaye draṣṭavyaḥ. See Paṇśikar 1935, 80.

[5]:

Dyczkowski 2023 VIII, 12, fn. 24.

[6]:

Khanna 1986, 58.

[7]:

Translation by Ratié 2007, 315.