The Paramarthasara, or ‘Essence of Ultimate Reality’, is a work of the Kashmirian polymath Abhinavagupta (tenth and eleventh centuries). It is a brief treatise in which the author outlines the doctrine of which he is a notable exponent, namely nondualistic Saivism, which he designates in his works as the Trika, or ‘Triad’ of three principles: Siva, Sakti and the embodied soul (nara). This book presents, along with a critically revised Sanskrit text, the first annotated English translation of both Abhinavagupta’s Paramarthasara and Yogaraja’s commentary.

John Nemec examines the beginnings of the non-dual tantric philosophy of the famed Pratyabhijña or "Recognition [of God]" School of tenth-century Kashmir, the tradition most closely associated with Kashmiri Shaivism. In doing so it offers, for the very first time, a critical edition and annotated translation of a large portion of the first Pratyabhijña text ever composed, the Sivadrsti of Somananda. In an extended introduction, Nemec argues that the author presents a unique form of non-dualism, a strict pantheism that declares all beings and entities found in the universe to be fully identical with the active and willful god Siva. This view stands in contrast to the philosophically more flexible panentheism of both his disciple and commentator, Utpaladeva, and the very few other Saiva tantric works that were extant in the author's day. Nemec also argues that the text was written for the author's fellow tantric initiates, not for a wider audience. This can be adduced from the structure of the work, the opponents the author addresses, and various other editorial strategies. Even the author's famous and vociferous arguments against the non-tantric Hindu grammarians may be shown to have been ultimately directed at an opposing Hindu tantric school that subscribed to many of the grammarians' philosophical views. Included in the volume is a critical edition and annotated translation of the first three (of seven) chapters of the text, along with the corresponding chapters of the commentary. These are the chapters in which Somananda formulates his arguments against opposing tantric authors and schools of thought. None of the materials made available in the present volume has ever been translated into English, apart from a brief rendering of the first chapter that was published without the commentary in 1957. None of the commentary has previously been translated into any language at all.

This is a sequel to a volume published in 2011 by OUP under the title The Ubiquitous 'Siva: Som=ananda's 'Sivad.r.s.ti and his Tantric Interlocutors. The first volume offered an introduction, critical edition, and annotated translation of the first three chapters of the 'Sivad.r.s.ti of Som=ananda, along with its principal commentary, the 'Sivad.r.s.tiv.rtti, written by Utpaladeva. It dealt primarily with 'Saiva theology and the religious views of competing esoteric traditions. The present volume presents the fourth chapter of the 'Sivad.r.s.ti and 'Sivad.r.s.tiv.rtti and addresses a fresh set of issues that engage a distinct family of opposing schools and authors of mainstream Indian philosophical traditions. In this fourth chapter, Som=ananda and Utpaladeva engage logical and philosophical works that exerted tremendous influence in the Indian subcontinent in its premodernity. Among the authors and schools addressed by Som=ananda in this chapter are the Buddhist Epistemologists, and Dharmak=irti in particular; the Hindu school of hermeneutics, i.e., the M=im=a.ms=a; the Hindu realist schools of the logic- and debate-oriented Ny=aya and their ontologically-oriented partners, the Vaiśe.sika; and the Hindu, dualist S=a.mkhya and Yoga schools. Throughout this chapter, Som=ananda endeavors to explain his brand of 'Saivism philosophically. Som=ananda challenges his philosophical interlocutors with a single over-arching argument: he suggests that their views cannot coherethey cannot be explained logicallyunless their authors accept the 'Saiva non-duality for which he advocates. The argument he offers, despite its historical influence, remains virtually unstudied. The Ubiquitous 'Siva Volume II offers the first English translation of Chapter Four of the 'Sivad.r.s.ti and 'Sivad.r.s.tiv.rtti along with an introduction and critical edition.

The proceedings of the Third International Dharmakirti Conference held in Hiroshima in 1997 collect a number of papers devoted to the study of the great seventh-century Buddhist philosopher, Dharmakirti, and his impacts upon the succeeding generations of both Buddhist and non-Buddhist philosophers in India and Tibet. The Second International Dharmakirti Conference was held in Vienna, and its proceedings, Studies in the Buddhist Epistemological Tradition, have been published in this same series. The present volume contains the results of the important researches made by the major Dharmakirtian scholars in the world since the last conference, so that the readers can discover the present state of affairs in the field of Buddhist epistemology and logic. Some papers are concerned with the epistemological topics, such as the notion of perceptibility, and others with the purely logical problems like an empty subject. Some deal with the Buddhist theory of language called apoha in comparison with the views of Nagarjuna, Bhartrhari and others, while others are devoted to the ontological questions, such as how to determine the causal relationship. Several papers discuss Dharmakirti in the light of criticism made by Jaina, Nyaya or Minamsa philosophers. And finally the most remarkable feature of the present volume is the increase of number of contributions devoted to the study of Tibetan tradition of Buddhist epistemology and logic which has been developed under the great influence of Dharmakirti.