The Recognition Sutras (Pratyabhijñāhṛdayam)

A short work of twenty aphorisms (sūtras) with the author's own commentary, written by Kṣemarāja, a leading disciple of Abhinavagupta, to present the Recognition (Pratyabhijñā) philosophy of Kashmir Śaivism to readers without training in its demanding logic. The title means 'the heart of recognition'. The first sūtra states the thesis: consciousness, in its absolute freedom, is the cause of the whole universe. By its own will it unfolds the world on its own screen, appearing as the many levels of reality (tattvas) and as individual knowers. The limited self is consciousness that has contracted (saṃkoca) itself; it still performs, in a hidden way, the five acts of the divine, from creation to concealment and grace. Bondage is not knowing this, and liberation is recognising one's own nature as Śiva, the free and blissful awareness that was never lost. The final sūtras describe practices for expanding the centre and resting in that recognition even in daily life.

It is the clearest short introduction to Kashmir Śaiva non-dualism, offering a view on which the world is not an illusion but the free self-expression of consciousness.