Chapter Three: The Madhura Disposition in India's Inner (Esoteric) Religious Disciplines

—denotes Shakti; if i is removed from Śiva, he becomes śava, a corpse.¹ Shakti is therefore the object of worship, and the Shaktas who worship her are Kaulas. This doctrine differs fundamentally from Buddhist practice. Its goal is Shiva, undivided, nondual, and imperishable, whereas Buddhist practice aims at the disposition of no-self. Just as shadow cannot remain without a tree and smoke cannot remain without fire, Shiva and Shakti are inseparable; neither can be conceived without the other.²

The Kaula Upaniṣad gives an extremely concise yet powerful presentation of the Kaula path. It begins by saying that after Brahman has been investigated, inquiry arises into Brahman's power, or Dharma. Knowledge and intelligence are both forms of Dharma, or Shakti, and knowledge alone is the cause of liberation. Yoga and liberation are both knowledge. Ignorance causes adharma, yet even this ignorance is not separate from knowledge.

The manifested field of sound, touch, taste, smell, and form is God. The impermanent too is eternal, because it is also a form of Brahman's power. The meaning is that Brahman and Brahman's power are not distinct.

The living being has five bonds: (1) regarding the non-self as self; (2) regarding the self as non-self; (3) knowledge of mutual difference among living beings; (4) regarding worshipped and worshipper as different; and (5) regarding the self as separate from consciousness, the Supreme Brahman.

These five bonds too are forms of knowledge, because all are the play of Brahman's power. Through them a person enters the cycles of birth and death. Liberation is in this very body. Knowledge means that sight—the self—is foremost among all the senses. Everything is a form of Shambhavi, Shakti.

For a practitioner of this path there is no Veda. The Vedas and other authorities should be abandoned before mantra-perfection. The secret should be disclosed to no one except the worthy. One should remain inwardly Shakta, outwardly Shaiva, and Vaishnava in public assembly: this is the prescribed conduct.³ Liberation comes through knowledge of the Self alone. Public censure is to be avoided.

The spiritual rule is: do not observe vows and do not live under fixed regulations, for regulation obstructs liberation. One should establish no Kaula sect. One should maintain equal vision toward all. The one who does this is liberated—he alone is liberated. This, briefly, is innate practice. Free of every duality and untouched by every entanglement, the Kaula Upaniṣad and Akulavīra Tantra plainly—