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Kshemaraja introduces this book (pp. 89-90) by listing twenty-two forms of Svacchanda-bhairava that the text has already enumerated for various ceremonies. 1 In this book, he explains, the text presents a twenty-third form, the essence of all the others, Svacchandah as the lord without parts (niskalanathah). And intent on demonstrating textual continuity, Kshemaraja interprets the meditation just presented as directed to the realization of this form of Svacchandah. In his own manner, therefore, Kshemaraja recognizes that after the preceding books that presented general Saiva material, such as the planes and worlds, the text now turns to specific Bhairava practices. In particular, as recognized by Kshemaraja, the first section of this book describes a Bhairava ritual related to the meditation that closed the preceding book. Dialogue begins (p.90) this section by requesting the ritual (yagah) which constitutes the essence (sarah) of this scripture. In answer, a pair of verses apparently describe an initiation (diksa) effected by an oblation (homah) performed with the formula of Svacchandah, comprising the Pranavah and the face and limbs formula. Just like the preceding cultivation of Svacchandah, therefore, that produced an immediate liberating intuition of his essence, so this rite seemingly initiates simply and directly. By both their focus on Svacchandah and their condensed and immediate efficacy, these practices contrast with the standard Saiva initiation set out in previous books that operates in a protracted ascent through the worlds and planes. In this way, though using material props, this initiation resembles 1 According to Ksemaraja's reckoning, these forms of Svacchanda-bhairava include: the lord of the matrix; Svacchandah surrounded by the eight subsidiary bhairava and each of these bhairava taken separately; the ninefold self (navatma) formula taken together and singly; and Kotaraksah alone and with his retinue.

358 the condensed noetic initiation (vijnanadiksa) set out in book four as an option to the standard initiation liturgy. According to Ksemaraja's commentary, that noetic ritual also employed the formula of the Bhairava without parts. As he there notes, the first book, which set forth the formula, lauded the potency of his formula to remove impurities by a single utterance. 1 The first part of this book reflects the same exaltation of bhairava and his tradition vis-a-vis other Saiva traditions. Specifically, Bhairava adepts in the line of the tradition that codified the hierarchy of means (upayah), may have elaborated this ritual as a elite option to the preceding practices. This hypothesis would explain the placement of this ritual here, as a type of appendix, and its selfcharacterization as the essence of the text. Alternatively, the simplicity and empowering immediacy of this ritual may only indicate that it belongs to the uncomplicated core Bhairava material used to construct other Bhairava sections of the text. It would then have become displaced in the course of compiling the text, and its contrast with preceding books would be an effect of this compilation rather than of deliberation. In his commentary, to counteract differing interpretations induced, no doubt, by the brevity and ambiguity of this pair of verses, Kshemaraja stresses the non-partite nature of the formula employed. Integrating this initiation into the standard Saiva categories set out in the fourth book, Kshemaraja equates this rite with preliminary ceremonies undertaken by the adept who has received the law of Shiva initiation (sivadharmidiksa). 2 For the immediately following (pp. 93-94) verses describe the special practice of an adept employing the repetition (japah) of the formula of the lord without parts. These verses instruct the adept, 1 V. bk.4, pp. 316-317. On other condensed, abbreviated initiations, cf. M.K. Shastri, ed., Tantraloka 18. 2 V. bk.4, p.41, vs.83.

359 properly prepared by concentration and restraint, while he repeats ten lakhs of this formula, to offer a lakh of oblations of bdellium smeared human flesh. Then, the text promises, he obtains the success of the high, middle, and low rites found in all other texts. 1 This final declaration carries the rhetorical marker, "so according to the word of bhairava," found previously in other Bhairava sections of the text. 2 In such a section in the sixth book, the adept oblated human flesh, characterized sirnilarly as bestowing benefits of the three kinds of rites. 3 There, however, the adept used the formula of Svacchandah with parts, while here he uses the formula of Svacchandah without parts. In the compiling of the text, therefore, these practices have not been combined, but arranged in parallel structures, differentiated by the formula employed. For this reason, no doubt, Kshemaraja insisted on the without parts nature of the formula employed in this book. Immediately after the description of the adept's practice, dialogue introduces a collection of specific rites (pp. 95-108), for the adept to perform, called the best treasury of teaching verses (karikakosam uttamam). 4 These rites, performed primarily for 1 The text specifically mentions the three kinds of rites, high (uttama-), middle (madhya-) and low (adhama-) and the four kinds of texts, according to their seats (catuspitham). (For the levels, cf. bk.8, p.11, vs. 19, and for the four kinds of text, bk 1, p.9, vs.5, and commentary, p.10.) 鈥� 2 V. p. 94, vs.7 b: " bhairavasya vaco yatha. "Cf. the other references in the notes to bk.11, pp.63-79. Kshemaraja explains this declaration as putting aside any doubts about the efficacy of the practice: "bhairavasya vaco yathetyanena natra mayapramatrsulabhah samsayo grahya iti adisati. 3 V. bk.6, p.146. 4 To define the karika, Kshemaraja (p.95) quotes a traditional verse: ""svalpabhidhanenartho yah samasenocyate budhaih / sutratah sanusartavya karikarthopadarsini. "

360 subjugation (vasikaram), continue the parallelism with the structure of the sixth book, which discusses similar rites after an exposition of the main formula. They do not, however, exhibit an intrinsic connection with the preceding ritual of initiation by referring to Svacchandah or the formula without parts. As suggested by their use of different metres not found elsewhere in the text, and the collective label of the introductory dialogue, they may presumably have been interpolated into the text as a block lifted from another source. Among these rites, the first nine (pp. 95-102), which have distinctive metres, and which all describe rites of subjugation performed in a cremation ground, would appear to definitely compose the "treasury of verses." The last five rites, written in normal slokah, and differing in content, probably represent a separate set. In this first set of rites, the solitary adept, at night in the cremation ground, writes down in blood the name of someone to be subjugated or conjured. Through offering oblations into the cremation fire while reciting the name interlaced with formula, he becomes empowered to summon the subjugated demon, god, or king. Aside from differences in formula, or intended victims, the rites simply differ in details. Thus, for his ink the adept usually uses blood extracted from corpses of people who died particular violent deaths, but sometimes his own blood, or either mixed with pigments. He usually writes on skulls, but sometimes on the ground or on the wall of the cremation ground. After the last of these rites, which uses the abode (dhama), designating according to Kshemaraja the root formula, and a skull mounted on a spit, comes (pp. 102-103) a pair of slokah that praise a special devotion to the formula on the skull for producing a king of the mountain, interpreted by Kshemaraja, as a highest adept. The philosophic characterization of the three forms of the dhama, manifest (vyaktam), unmanifest (avyaktam), and manifest-unmanifest (vyaktavyaktam), on which the adept

361 meditates in this devotion, contrasts with the style and content of the surrounding rites. In addition, only this last rite explicitly prescribes the root formula, presumably the Svacchandah without parts, which supposedly all the rites in this book employ. Thus these last explanatory slokah, or the entire last rite, may represent a later interpolation. Excising this last rite would equally restore an exact parallelism with the sixth book which describes eight rites of subjugation. Another rite of subjugation (p. 103) follows, that differs from the preceding by substances and procedure, and by employing the formula of Svacchandah without parts explicitly. Rather than with the preceding rites, therefore, it belongs with the three following (pp. 104-108) rites for obstructing, for maddening and undoing this maddening, and for attracting and undoing this attraction, which all use similar substances and the formula of Svacchandah without parts. Though connected to the preceding set of rites by association with the cremation ground, this set of rites, would actually appear to form an independent set, which, once again, more closely resembles the rites described in book six. Since the second set of rites uses the formula of Svacchandah without parts, bestowed on the adept in the initiation described in the first part of the book, they would seemingly represent the core practices initially used to construct this book. The set of nine rites of subjugation, in contrast, would then represent a later group of related practices, secondarily interpolated as a block into the text. As noted previously, however, the sixth book has a parallel structure, including the set of rites of subjugation. In the absence of external information, therefore, it remains possible that this book was constructed, at the outset, on the model of the preceding book, with both sets of rites.