Essay name: Svacchandatantra (history and structure)
Author: William James Arraj
The essay represents a study and partial English translation of the Svacchandatantra and its commentary, 鈥淯ddyota鈥�, by Kshemaraja. The text, attributed to the deity Svacchanda-bhairava, has various names and demonstrates a complex history of transmission through diverse manuscript traditions in North India, Nepal, and beyond.
Page 346 of: Svacchandatantra (history and structure)
346 (of 511)
External source: Shodhganga (Repository of Indian theses)
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nonetheless rebinds the soul to transmigration. The source
document used to construct this section probably contained this
praise of S膩mkhya knowledge. Instead of excising it, in as much as
it represented the entire description of the knowledge disposition,
redactors retained it and added this final verse, qualifying this
knowledge as subordinate to the lord.
Third, for dispassionateness, instead of members of the
intellectual emanation as in preceding lists, the text lists specific
austerities such as the five fires (pa帽c膩gni岣�), and ritual suicide.
For mastery, the text also lists specific acts, including, notably,
criminal acts, which its realization makes possible. Without
morally rationalizing the instructions to commit such reprehensible
acts, K峁mar膩ja岣� simply comments that acts like deceitful
murder, for example, help acquire mastery of their corresponding
constituent, in this case, tama岣� or darkness. Closing this section,
the text then discusses the negative dispositions almost as if an
interconnected set of circumstances; acts of unrighteousness
(adharma岣�) lead, as it were, to the ignorance (aj帽膩nam) which
believes that no right or wrong exists. And in this misery, the
person drags on suffering in passionateness (avair膩gyam), or
persists unconcerned in a worsening condition through lack of
mastery (anai艣varyam).
The next section (pp. 26-30) characterizes matter and the
three constituents. The first verse calls matter or the unmanifest
that which contains the three constituents, the stimulator
(pravartaka岣�) of transmigration, and that through which there is
the production of the world (jagadutpatti岣�). Recognizing that these
verses invite a S膩mkhya interpretation, K峁mar膩ja岣� adds the
qualification that matter exercises these functions only through the
impulse of the lord (i艣varah). Historically, however, this
unqualified characterization points to a probable earlier S膩mkhya
context for this section.
The text presents the three constituents by characterizing the
prototypical men that would result from their unalloyed
