Abhinavagupta’s Arguments for Coexistence and Peace Among Traditions: Understanding the Transcendent Unity of Traditions Vis-à-Vis Uniqueness of Kashmir Saivism

The paper aims at showing that religio-philosophical divergence between traditions can’t be appropriated for exclusivism that breeds intolerance and conflict. The divergence between sages and traditions is to be put in perspective of what Schuon has called transcendent unity of religions to exclusively Saivist interpretation of Abhinavagupta may be erroneous and we need to emphasize traditionalist roots of Abhinavagupta’s approach to diversity of revelations/traditions. By virtue of being a nondualist and a metaphysician as distinguished from being a theologian/philosopher in the sense traditionalist school uses these terms, Abhinava transcends all sectarian or exclusivist theological or philosophical positions. He is best described as a sage, a traditional metaphysician who happens to use the idiom of Saivites. There is little Saivist (if understood in exclusivist exoteric theological terms) about him. Analyzing his view of scripture and plurality of salvific paths, the paper concludes by comparing Abhinavagupta’s foregrounding the case for certain finality of Trika Saivism with Schuon’s defense of claims of finality of Islam.