Kaula Jnana Nirnaya (Calcutta Sanskrit Series)

It is difficult to say at present if the entire system or only a few of its methods had been invented by him. Some of the āsanas yogic postures and mudrās symbolic hand gestures or seals in the Haṭhayoga a physical and spiritual discipline focused on balancing the body are, however, expressly associated with his name; for example, Matsyendrāsanam Matsyendra's posture, Matsyendranāthābhimatam padmāsanam the lotus posture approved by Matsyendranātha, etc. I have tried to prove that other elements of this yoga can be also discovered in our texts. Moreover, an entire verse of the Kaulajñānanirṇaya is found in the Haṭhayoga-pradīpikā almost in the same form:

Where the gaze is, there the mind goes, where the senses are, there the soul is not. One's own powers and the living beings, through the gaze, are dissolved. [III. 2-3]

Compare with the Haṭhayoga:

Where the gaze is dissolved, there the senses and elements are. Both the power and the living beings are merged into the invisible and dissolved. [IV. 14]

Under these circumstances, it may be held that there is some truth in the tradition which associates Haṭhayoga with Matsyendra.

I have not said anything about the state of preservation of the Kaulajñānanirṇaya. In the colophon of the text (p. 83) it is said that the text consists of 1000 verses. Taking into consideration the portion of the first chapter which has been lost and calculating according to the Nepalese way (in which 32 letters of any prose portion also are equivalent to a verse), my estimate goes up to about 800 verses. It, therefore, seems that the text has suffered damage in other places too, which cannot be ascertained.

In giving the abstracts of the texts, I have tried to draw the attention of the readers only to the main ideas contained in each of the chapters. In this, I may be sometimes misled by the queer constructions and by the technical terms, many of which are not yet clear to me. I have left aside altogether the study of the mantras sacred incantations.