Abhinavagupta's Attitude towards Yoga.

• Author: Torella, Raffaele
• Position: Critical essay

A major characteristic of the aristocratic attitude--and I would not know how to better define the flavor that pervades the whole of Abhinavagupta's work (cf. Torella forthcoming a)--is the downgrading of all painful effort, seen as a plebeian feature. The aristocrat intends to show that what inferior people can achieve only at the cost of long and painful exercises is accessible to him promptly and very easily. No slow and painful ascent step by step, but only an elegant, powerful, and effortless jump is effective. One of the recurring qualifications for Abhinavagupta's attitude to the spiritual path is precisely absence of effort (yatna, prayatna), absence of exertion or fatigue (ayasa, prayasa), easiness (sukha, sughata). This can be clearly detected in Abhinavagupta's attitude to yoga, or, to be more precise, to Patanjala yoga. In the summary of the topics of the Tantraloka (TA), at the end of Ahnika I, he lists yoganganupayogitvam (and kalpitarcadyanadarah).

USELESSNESS OF THE ANGAS OF YOGA. KNOWLEDGE VS. ACTION

The uselessness of Patanjali's yogangas (and, more generally, of all yogangas regardless of their specific character and the philosophical-religious context in which they are situated; see below) is restated at several points in the TA (1): e.g., IV.87 iti panca yamah saksat samvittau nopayoginah "the five restraints are of no direct use for [realizing] consciousness"; IV.95 tad esa dharanadhyanasamadhitritayl param I samvidam prati no kancid upayogam samasnute || "The three angas--fixation, visualization, absorption--do not have any usefulness with regard to supreme consciousness." The charge of uselessness is also specifically ascribed to one of the pillars of Patanjala yoga, abhyasa 'repeated practice': IV.104 tad advayayam samvittav abhyaso 'nupayogavdn I kevalam dvaitamdlinyasankanirmulanaya sah || "Repeated practice is of no use for non-dual consciousness; it can only serve to uproot the presumption of the impurity of duality." However, in the spiritual path (and perhaps in any human activity...) what is useless may also be obnoxious in that it involves wasting of energies or targeting a wrong aim, or even making one lose sight of the true aim or obscuring its nature. This is, according to Abhinavagupta, the case of the "internal" yogangas (pratydhara, dhdrana, dhydna, and samadhi), which due to their appearing closer to the final aim may result in being even more insidious. But before delving into the anupayogitvam issue we should address a preliminary, and even more basic, question. Abhinava does it already in Ahnika I while giving the first account of the upaya doctrine as outlined in MVU. The lowest upaya, anava, is also called kriyopaya (TA I. 149C). However, the whole of non-dualistic Saiva tradition agrees that only knowledge is entitled to be an upaya to liberation, (2) and, furthermore, what is the relationship, if any, between knowledge and action? (Cf. Brunner 1992; see also Brunner 1994.)

TAV: nanu jnanam eva upayah iti samanyena pratijnatam, tat katham anave kriyopdyatvam uktam ity asankyaha yato nanya kriya nama jnanam eva hi tat tatha | rudher yogantatam praptam iti srigamasasane || I.150 || TAV: anya iti arthaj jhanat, yatah taj jnanam eva rudheh prarohat yogasyantah para kastha tattvam praptam sat tatha kriyeti sarvatra abhidhiyate ity arthah | nanu atra kim pramanam ity asankyoktam iti srigamasasane iti, arthad uktam iti sesah. [Objection:] It is generally accepted [in our system] that only knowledge can be a means; then, how is it possible to state that in the "minimal" [means] action can be a means? [Reply:] Because action is not different [from knowledge] in that this knowledge--once arrived, after its growing, at the point in which it results in yoga--becomes action. This is what the Gamasasana teaches. TAV: Not different--it is understood: "from knowledge," because knowledge itself having reached, after growing, i.e., evolving, at the end, i.e., at the ultimate level, the true essence of yoga, is called everywhere "action": this is the meaning. (3) [Objection:] But on what authority is this assertion based? It is ["said," we add] in the Gamasasana. Once established that there is no basic otherness between action and knowledge, Abhinava has to deal with the next issue: what is the precise connection between yoga, on the one hand, and jnana and kriya, on the other? (we will come back to this delicate question later on). Now, after yoga in the broadest sense has been somehow "accepted" as a means, let us consider whether Patanjala yoga can deserve such, however cautious, inclusion.

The uselessness of the angas of yoga, though being a leitmotif of the entire TA, receives a specific treatment in Ahnika IV, following the authority of the Viravali-tantra. Abhinava begins by liquidating with a few disdainful words yama, niyama, asana, and pranayama (the "external" angas).

ahimsa satyam asteyabrahmacaryaparigrahah | iti panca yamah saksat samvittau nopayoginah || IV.87 || tapahprabhrtayo ye ca niyama yat tathasanam | pranayamas ca ye sarvam etad bahyavijrmbhitam || IV.88 || Harmlessness, truthfulness, abstinence from theft, sexual continence, and absence of greed: these five restraints are not directly useful to consciousness. The observances, like penance etc., and also posture and regulation of breath, all these are manifestations concerning the external. The Viravali-tantra passage quoted in TA does not even mention yama and niyama, and starts directly with pranayama: (4)

pranayamo na kartavyah sariram yena pidyate | IV.90ab | Regulation of breath should not be performed, since it [just] torments the body. Then, again following the authority of the Vlravali, Abhinava sets out to an apparently more difficult task: showing the uselessness also of the "internal" angas: pratyahara, dharana, dhyana, and samadhi. (5) Pratyahara is useless, because withdrawing the senses from their objects results in reinforcing the bondage instead of loosening it, since it suggests the idea that consciousness resides in some places and not in others.

pratyaharas ca namayam arthebhyo 'ksadhiyam hi yah | anibaddhasya bandhasya tad antah kila kilanam || IV.92 || TAV: ayam hi nama pratyaharo yad arthebhyo rupadibhyah pratyahrtandm caksuradindri-yajnananam antah kilanam cittasvarupanukarayamanataya svatmayattatasadanam, yad uktam svavisayasamprayoge cittasya svarupanukara ivendriyanam pratyahara iti, tad eva ca anibaddhasya samsaro 'sti na tattvatas tanubhrtam bandhasya varttaiva kd ityadinyayena alabdha-prarohasyapi bandhasya kilanam dardhyapadanam. parasya hi samvidah svasvdtantryat grhitasankocaya desadyavacchinnatvam nama bandhah sa eva catra kutascit pratyahrtanam indriyanam kutracid avasthapanad upodbalikrtah, iti katham nama pratyaharadeh samvit-saksatkarayopayogah, vyapikaya hi samvidah katham nama kutracid evopalambho bhavet iti bhavah. evam dharanadav api avaseyam. The "withdrawing" at stake here is the withdrawing of sensorial faculties from their objects. This, in fact, amounts to internally tightening a knot which has not [yet] got tight. TAV: This is, in fact, "withdrawing": internally fastening the sensorial cognitions, such as sight, which have been withdrawn from their objects, like form and so on--fastening in the sense of bringing them to self-dependence inasmuch as they are being made to imitate the own form of the mind. This is said in the Yogasutra [II.54]: "The withdrawal of the senses is, as it were, the imitation of the mind-stuff itself on the part of the organs by disjoining themselves from their objects" (tr. Woods 1917: 197). And this very [withdrawal] is tightening, i.e., hardening, a bondage which had not yet fully developed, according to the principle: "samsara has no real existence, [so] what talk can there be for humans about bondage?" Bondage is nothing else than the fact that supreme consciousness, having assumed contraction due to its own freedom, is limited by space, etc. Such bondage is reinforced if the sensorial faculties, withdrawn from some objects, are made to rest on some others. Hence, how can withdrawal, etc., serve for experiencing consciousness? For how can consciousness, pervasive as it is, be perceived in some places only? This is the meaning. The same can be applied also to "fixation," etc. Referring to what Abhinava says elsewhere, we may add that pratyahara has the additional negative effect of reducing the capacity of the sensorial faculties, that is, the Goddesses of the Senses or Cognitions (karanesvaris or samviddevis) to assimilate external reality to consciousness. (6)

Essentially the same criticism can be extended to the next two angas, dharana 'fixation' and dhyana 'visualization'. At last, it is the turn of samadhi itself to be liquidated.

cittasya visaye kvapi bandhanam dharanatmakam | tatsadrgjnanasamtano dhyanam astamita param [read: astamitaparam] || IV.93 || yada tu jneyatadatmyam eva samvidi jayate | grahyagrahanatadvaitasunyateyam samahitih || IV.94 || TAV: tatra hi kandadau niyata eva dese cittasya bandho rupam yad uktam desabandhas cittasya dharaneti | dhyane 'pi sajatiyanam eva jnananam pravahadrupatvam nama rupam, na vijatiyanam, ity atra niyatakaravacchinnatvam | yad uktam tatra pratyayaikatanata dhyanam iti, ata eva astamita param [read: astamitaparam] ity uktam | samadhav api jnanajneyakhya-rupadvayatiraskarena dhyeyatmajneyamatrapratibhasa eva rupam, ity atra niyata evakaro 'vacchedakah. yad uktam tad evarthamatranirbhasam svarupasunyam iva samadhir iti. Binding the mind to a certain object is the anga called "fixation." An uninterrupted series of cognitions similar to each other is the anga called "visualization" in which otherness has disappeared. When in consciousness the very identification with the knowable object arises, this is "absorption" (samahiti), namely the condition of being devoid of the perceiver/perceived duality. TAV: In it, the form is the binding of the mind on a particular place, such as...