This post is the third of a trinity of posts focusing on the oral teachings of the awakened Yoginīs of the Krama lineage. For the other two posts, see here and here. These three texts together constitute all the recorded evidence we have of what were, originally, powerful oral transmissions from the Yoginīs—teachings that were hugely significant for the Krama lineage (once the dominant lineage of of nondual Śākta-Śaiva Tantra), but were virtually forgotten by the modern period. Even people who have practiced and read about “Kashmir Shaivism” for decades do not know the Kaula-sūtras or the Chummās and are often only glancingly familiar with the Vātūlanātha Sūtras. These three revelatory scriptures derived from the wisdom-transmissions of the Yoginīs will form the backbone of my forthcoming book on the Krama (aka Mahārtha) lineage.
The Vātūlanātha-Sūtras, the “sutras of the Intoxicated Lord” or the “sutras of the Wild Master,” were written down over 1000 years ago (exact date unknown) and first published 100 years ago in Kashmīr, but never made accessible to a non-specialist audience until now.
Swat Valley, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, formerly the Tantrik kingdom of Uḍḍiyāna
Below you will find all 13 sūtras of this astonishing text, but be warned, most of them are not comprehensible without Anantaśakti’s fascinating commentary. As a sample, the commentary for Sūtra 1 can be found below.
The Thirteen Sutras of the Intoxicated Lord (the Vatulanatha-sutras)
Invocation verses by ‘Someone’ (Anantaśakti):
I bow to that [wisdom] which has arisen from the ocean of the heart of [my guru], the reverend Lord Vātūla, and which is free from [the dualistic categories of] worship, worshipper, and worshipped. ||
Because of that [wisdom], I abide constantly permeated by the Great Spaciousness, free of linearity in it, even in the midst of the thoughts and activities of this world. ||
I venerate the Unsurpassable—unprecedented, impenetrable, intangible, and non-localizable—the ecstatic union (ghaṭṭana) of the analytic and synthetic capacities of consciousness. ||
Enhanced by the Ultimate Reality, this definitive commentary on the Sūtras that arose from the mouths of the Yoginīs has been written correctly by Someone. ||
Prose introduction by ‘Someone’ (Anantaśakti):
In this world, according to tradition, the Yoginīs of the Sacred Site first taught the reverend Vātūlanātha the collection of Chummās—though [in truth their insights] cannot be taught [in mere words], being beyond all doctrines, beginning with the six Viewpoints and the four [Kaula] Transmissions and ending with the [Krama] Melāpa—and then taught [him] through these Sūtras the extraordinary, unbroken (anavakāśa) highest reality—which is free of the stain of [the dualities of] process and immediacy (kramākrama), existence and non-existence, the real and the unreal, plurality and unity, the conceptual and the nonconceptual, existence in the world and liberation—doing so by revealing in [his] direct experience [that which is pointed to by] the thirteen oral teachings (kathā) nourished by the ultimate secret.
The 13 Sutras taught by the Yoginīs and transmitted by Vātūlanātha:
Through the activity of the Great Spontaneous Immediacy, one stabilizes in one’s true nature. || (see below for commentary)
The flow of the activities [of consciousness] becomes all of a sudden saturated with the attainment of That. ||
Through breaking open the two casings, [there is] entry into the Great Emptiness. ||
Through devouring the pair, [there is] abiding in continuous & occasionless consciousness. ||
Through the ‘lovemaking’ of the siddhas and yoginīs, the great celebratory unification arises. ||
Through completely letting go of the three veils, one is established in the Nameless state. ||
The Resonance exists in [all] instances of the arising and subsiding of the four aspects of the Word. ||
By savouring the three nectars, [the experience of] the Supreme Absolute, utterly free, surges up spontaneously. ||
By the shining forth of the four goddesses, one is permanently established in [the state of] repose within oneself. ||
Through the Rise of the twelve currents, the Great Rays expand. ||
When the five observances arise, [there is] immersion into the Waveless. ||
Through immersion into awakened awareness, [there is] no more relationship with virtue and sin. ||
Through the power of the inexpressible oral teaching, [there is] the attainment of the Sign of Great Wonder; through that, the Resonance of the Void [is known]. ||
Commentary on the first sūtra by Anantaśakti:
Someone who is ‘kissed’ by a very intense, unimpeded Descent of Power, somewhere, sometime, somehow,[1] [and thus] has experienced immersion in his or her true nature (svarūpa-samāveśa) may attain their true nature through the activity of the Great Spontaneous Immediacy (mahā-sāhasa),[2] that is, through the suddenly expansive flashing forth of the voracious and extremely ‘thick’ Ultimate Vibration (paranāda), culminating in Immersion into the great Spatiality free of veils, [a culmination which can take place] through the friction of the masses of [the two types of] cognition, conceptual and non-conceptual. To attain one’s true nature means to attain the intangible consciousness that is natural, occasion-less, unexcelled, waveless, boundaryless, and without specific locality, because it transcends all conceptuality. This is the secret meaning.[3]
[Commentary on the other 12 sūtras not included here but was shared in our global online retreat.]
Concluding text by Anantaśakti: “At the time of the great Ecstatic Union (melāpa), the Yoginīs of the Sacred Site, in oneness with the unsurpassable state, revealed the oral tradition rendered in the form of these sūtras to a particular avadhūt [named Vātūlanātha]. They did so through the teaching on the direct experience of [that which is pointed to by] the thirteen oral teachings, which are [beyond] the six Viewpoints, the four [Kaula] Transmissions, and [even] the Melāpa-Krama.”
Footnotes:
[1] akasmād eva, with no apparent reason or cause whatsoever.
[2] sāhasa: sudden(ness), audacity, courage, intensity, daring, temerity, precipitate, violent; Fr. inopinée; “a sudden eruption of intuition” (Dycz.); derived from sahas, power, force, lustre etc.
[3] Cf. the final Kaulasūtra: ḍāmaroktopāsaka-sādhaka-siddhi-sayujāṃ sahaiva sahasā sāhasācaraṇāt samarasībhūtānāṃ vastūnāṃ vastuni na antaraṅga-bahiraṅgatā parasparam: “For those who practice Bold Spontaneity and are thereby powerfully united with the attainment had [only] by the practitioners who venerate that which is spoken of with astonishment, there is no longer any mutual distinction between ‘internal’ and ‘external’ in the reality of things that have fused into Oneness.”
