PART 1
According to the Kashmir Shivaism doctrine (shivagama), Gods Supreme Conscience is not only a witness, a distant and cold consciousness that is completely detached to the worlds problems.
Consequently, the Absolute Conscience is not only knowledge but also activity. According to Kashmir Shivaism, activity is suggested by the existence of an infinite vibration (resonance), of an eternally creative pulsation that emits, supports and absorbs each moment all the manifested worlds.
From this perspective, the main element is vibration. In fact, the philosophical and practical system of Kashmir Shivaism refers to an essential aspect the resonance phenomenon.
The term of resonance is not explicitly mentioned in the texts and works of this authentic doctrine of vibration, but, the deep understanding of the notions of the system evidently imposes this term RESONANCE.
This philosophy indicates the accomplishment of the supreme goal in life, the supreme liberation, through the spontaneous and complete revelation of the identity of the individual Supreme Self with Shiva himself (God the Father).
On the other side, the school or the doctrine of vibration from the Kashmir Shivaism emphasizes the complete experience of the vibration or the pulsation of the Divine Consciousness.
Thus, the essence of this school lies in the deeply mystical and contemplative experience that the enlightened ones ecstatically live, an experience in which his individual consciousness ineffably identifies with God the Fathers Universal, Pervasive and Vibrating Conscience.
Any kind of activity from Macro cosmos, any perception, notion, sensation or emotion from the human beings micro cosmos derives and develops as a part of the universal rhythm of the Supreme Reality.
This Supreme Reality is Shiva himself (God the Father) that is, at the same time, both the Pure Conscious Agent (the one that acts) and the Perceiver (the one that observes) at the level of the entire Creation.
In other words, the doctrine of vibration says that the human being can reveal his true nature as being Shiva himself through the ecstatic identification with what the wise and liberated ones of Kashmir Shivaism named spanda.
Spanda refers to the creative, pulsating and dynamic activity of God the Fathers Absolute Consciousness.
THE SUPREME MANIFESTS THROUGH SPANDA
The deep significance’s of this term are so important that they must be carefully studied. Literally, spanda means movement or pulsation and spandana means a kind of movement.
Anyway, we know that any movement always takes place in a spatial-temporal frame which is a finite frame of creation. On the other hand, the Supreme Absolute (Shiva or Paramashiva for Kashmir Shivaism) transcends all the spatial and temporal notions.
That is why, spanda for the Supreme does not represent any physical movement, any psychic activity (like pain or pleasure) or any pran-ic activity (like hunger and thirst).
Spanda is the pulsation of the endless ecstasy of the Divine Consciousness (vimarsha), the pulsation of the Divine Creation and of its absolute Freedom (svatantrya).
The great sage and liberated one, Abhinavagupta, said:
“Spanda is a divine pulsation, an overwhelming ascension of the spiritual beatitude within the intimate and essential nature of the Divine, which therefore includes all successions. Anyway, in order to for humans to understand it better, spanda can be simply interpreted as a kind of movement (kincit).
But, we must notice that the term movement is inappropriate because the Divine as Shiva does not move closer or further. Indeed, from this supremely transcendent perspective, movement does really not mean anything.
That is why we can rightly ask how this term (movement) can be correctly applied to the activity of the Supreme because spanda means a kind of movement.
Abhinavagupta says that the expression a kind of movement refers to the fact that, in fact, even immobility appears to us as a kind of movement because, even if the divine light of the supreme consciousness doesnt change at all, it still seems to change.
The conclusion is that immobility itself appears in a variety of manifested ways within Creation. Essentially, spanda is the activity of the spiritual consciousness which doesnt mean that there is a movement or a change within itself (the consciousness) but that it is a “causa sine qua non” of all the kinds of manifestation. In other words it is the cause of manifestation.
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