Stavacintamani of Bhattanarayana

Stavacintamani is a composition of hymnal verses authored by Bhattanarayana, the great Siva-devotee of Kashmir. The Kashmiri Saivite writer Ksemaraja wrote a commentary on this book bringing out the philosophical, devotional and literary characteristics of the verses. The philosophical thoughts and the concept of devotion permeating within the verses follow the line of monistic Saivism of Kashmir also known as Pratyabhijna or Trik Philosophy. The Stavacintamani is an important composition in the tradition of philosophical hymnal literature. The author has prayed Lord Siva in manifold forms through the 120 invocatory verses of the composition. These verses show an unique merger of the philosophical and devotional or emotional dispositions. They, in fact, present an unparalleled illustration of how the monistic Saivism of Kashmir could be expressed through devotional songs. The invocations emerge from the bottom of mind of the devotee-poet, and admitting the entire universe as Lord Siva inhere all the objects-sentient as well as insentient and then merge where those emerged from. The process of emergence of devotional emotions from the mind, then staying outwardly and ultimately merging in the same mind is fully consistent with the principle Free Will of the monistic Saivism of Kashmir which enunciate that the entire world emerges from the universal mind of Lord Siva, stays on the same base but differently and separately and at the time of dissolution merges again in the same universal mind. The present book contains the original text of invocation (Stutis), translation of the text into Hindi and English and also the footnotes in order to explain the technical words and expressions used in the text. A comprehensive introduction given in the beginning of the book provides in brief the tradition of hymnal literature, introduction of the author Bhattanarayana and a comprehensive study of Stavacintamani with regards to its philosophical, devotional and literary aspects. As such the book would be very useful for the students of Monistic Saivism of Kashmir.