Utpaladeva in the context of "Pratyabhijna"

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⭐ Core Definition: Utpaladeva

Utpaladeva (c. 900–950 CE) was a Shaiva tantrik philosopher, theologian and poet from Kashmir. He belonged to the Trika Shaiva tradition and is a thinker of the Pratyabhijñā school of monistic idealism. His Īśvarapratyabhijñākārikā (IPK, Verses on the Recognition of the Lord) is a central text for the Pratyabhijñā school of Shaiva Hindu philosophy. Utpaladeva was also a tantrik guru and a religious bhakti poet, having authored the influential Śivastotrāvalī (A Garland of Hymns to Śiva), a collection of Shaiva hymns that remain popular with Kashmiri Shaivas.

Utpaladeva was a student of Somānanda (875–925 CE) and an influence on the exegete Abhinavagupta, whose works later overshadowed those of Utpaladeva. However, according to the Indologist Raffaele Torella "most of Abhinavagupta’s ideas are just the development of what Utpaladeva had already expounded."

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👉 Utpaladeva in the context of Pratyabhijna

Pratyabhijñā or Pratyabhigyā (Sanskrit: प्रत्यभिज्ञा, romanizedpratyabhijñā, lit.'re-cognition') is an idealistic, monistic, and theistic school of philosophy in Kashmir Shaivism which originated in the ninth century CE. The name of the system is derived from its most famous work, Īśvara-pratyabhijñā-kārikā by Utpaladeva.

The central thesis of this philosophy is that we are Śiva, and that we have to "re-cognise" this. Thus, the slave (paśu: the human condition) shakes off the fetters (pāśa) and becomes the master (pati: the divine condition).

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Utpaladeva in the context of Kashmir Shaivism

Kashmir Shaivism tradition is a 20th-century umbrella-term for a body of Sanskrit exegetical literature from several non-dualist Shaiva-Shakta tantric and monistic religious traditions, often used synonymously for the Trika-school or the "Philosophy of Recognition" (Pratyabhijñā). These traditions originated in Kashmir after 850 CE, as an adaptation to upper-class Hindu norms of 'wild' tantric Kaula traditions. Trika Shaivism later spread beyond Kashmir, particularly flourishing in the states of Odisha and Maharashtra.

Defining features of the Trika tradition are its idealistic and monistic pratyabhijna ("direct knowledge of one's self," "recognition") philosophical system, propounded by Utpaladeva (c. 925–975 CE) and Abhinavagupta (c. 975–1025 CE), and the use of several triades in its philosophy, including the three goddesses Parā, Parāparā, and Aparā.

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