Kashmir Shaivism

and Dzogchen
 By Sri Kamakoti Mandali on Feb 18, 2013 | In Darshana
- John Myrdhin Reynolds
The title of the Tantra, the Sanskrit original for Byang-chub kyi
sems kun-byed rgyal-po, is given as Bodhichitta-kulayaraja.
Bodhichitta, as we have repeatedly said, in the context of
Dzogchen means the Primordial State, and this is the usual
designation found in all of the rDzogschen Sems-sdeTantras.
But the term Kulayaraja is otherwise unknown in Sanskrit.
Dargyay would link it to the form Kularaja found in certain
texts of the Kashmiri Shaiva tradition. Kula has a wide range of
meaning in this system, including reference to the
manifestations of the Absolute. The term is also found in
another related system particularly connected with Kali
worship. The latter is known as Kaula and its practice as
Kaulachara. The Kaulas of Bengal have a ninefold system of
classification of their levels of teaching that is reminiscent of
the nine vehicles (theg-pa dgu) of the Nyingmapas and the
Bonpos. It is possible that Kulaya was adopted from a Shaivite
context, but this is not a sufficient reason to assume that the
term has the same meaning in the Buddhist system that it does
in a theistic Shaiva text. The appellationBhagavan is applied
both to the Buddha in the Buddhist system and to Krishna and
Vishnu in the Vaishnava system, but this does not mean that its
meaning is understood in the same way in Buddhism and in
Vaishnavism. The Bhagavad Gita was once translated into
Tibetan, and from this we learn that Bhagavan, as a title of
Krishna, is translated as Legs-ldan, whereas when it is applied
to Buddha, it is translated as bCom-ldan-‘das. It is said that
when the famous translator Rinchen Zangpo (958-1055) found
this Tibetan translation of the Bhagavad Gita in Western Tibet
and read its opening chapters, he was so horrified that he threw
the entire text into the river. So now, except for a few sample
verses which have been preserved, the rest of the translation
has been lost. Such was the new puritanism of the eleventh
century!
In the canonical Tangyur will be found translations of other
Shaiva texts relating to dreams, omens, and so forth, and a
large Shaiva text dealing with astrology, the Svarodaya Tantra
(dByangs’ char), but these are considered to be texts dealing
with secular sciences, rather than the innermost science of
spiritual liberation. Whether the Tantra we have here can be
shown to have any relationship to Kashmiri Shaivism other
than this mysterious termkulaya must await a comprehensive
study of the entire text.
Shaivism is indeed an ancient religious movement in India. Of
unknown, but of undoubtedly pre Indo-European origin, the
god Shiva came in later times to be identified with the Vedic
deity Rudra. One of the principal early Upanishads, the
Shvetopanishad, with its notion of Ishvara or the Lord, appears
to have links with Shaiva tradition. The oldest sectarian Shaiva
texts, known as the Shaivagamas, deal with the cult practices of
the god Shiva. The earliest systematic philosophical statement
of the Shaiva system is represented by the Pashupata Sutras,
associated with the name of the sage Lakulisha. The most
popular and widespread system of Shaiva philosophy, the
Shaiva Siddhanta, came to South India in the sixth or seventh
century CE, where it became the major rival of the earlier
Buddhism and Jainism. North Indian texts summarizing the
more unsystematic Agamas were translated into the Tamil
language, like the famous Tirumanthiram of Tirumular. All of
these forms of Shaiva philosophy were pluralistic, postulating
the ultimate reality of three principles: pati, pashu and pasha,
that is, God, individual souls and bondage to the cycle of death
and rebirth.
Where as these earlier forms of Agamic Shaivism, like
Pashupata and Siddhanta, are distinctly dualistic and theistic in
character, Kashmiri Shaivism has a thoroughgoing monistic or
advaita view. This monistic standpoint is shared with the
Advaita Vedanta of Shankaracharya and with the Shakta system
of Bengal. However, a key difference does exist here. The view
adhered to by the Advaita Vedanta is known as Mayavada, that
is to say, the appearance of diversity in the world is merely an
illusion (maya). It is like a man seeing a rope lying across his
path and in the darkness mistaking it for a snake. This illusion
has no ontological status. Rather, it represents an
epistemological problem. In the Vedantic system, the ultimate
reality is known as Brahman, and nothing else exists. The view
associated with Kashmiri Shaivism and with Shaktism is known
as Shaktivada, wherein Maya, or the world illusion, in all its
diversity, is granted a certain ontological status. This diversity
is an illusion in the sense that it lacks any inherent or
independent reality, but it does possess a kind of relative reality
in that it represents the energy, or shakti, of Chit, or primordial
awareness (chitshakti). Maya is thus not just a mistake in
perception, mistaking the rope for a snake; it is not something
merely passive but something active and dynamic, a creative
energy, or Mayashakti, which brings diversity into
manifestation. Here there are some philosophical parallels with
Dzogchen. Although the Tibetan term rtsal, “energy, potency,
potentiality”, is never glossed as Shakti in the Dzogchen texts,
the conceptions embodied in these two terms are quite similar.
The Dzogchen term rig-pa’i rtsal, “the potency or energy of
awareness”, could almost be translated as Vidyashakti, which is
a technical term found in the Shaiva and Shakta systems. It
refers to the energy inherent within the primordial non-dual
Awareness which gives rise to the diversity of manifestations.
Also, the term for “manifestation” or “appearance” (snang-ba,
abhasa), is found in a similar context in both systems.
Kashmiri Shaivism, as a distinct movement separate from the
earlier forms of dualistic Shaivism based on the Shaivagamas,
certainly arose with the Shiva Sutras of Vasugupta in the ninth
century Kashmir, if not before. Have we a synchronicity here?
This is precisely the era when Dzogchen was developing and
spreading in Tibet among both Buddhists and Bonpos.
According to Nyingmapa tradition, the historical advent of
Dzogchen occured earlier than the ninth century with the
activities of Garab Dorje in Uddiyana and India and so on;
however, the ninth century may have been the time of the
composing of part or all of the kun-byed rgyal-po.