eating, burning and cooking - the all-devouring Fire

TA 3.262–4, vol.2, KS no. 28 (Bombay: 1921); also Abhinavagupta: A Trident of Wisdom (Par�trimsik� = PTV henceforth), transl. by J. Singh (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1989), pp.156–159 (esp. 159). Abhinava’s foremost disciple, Kshemar�ja, describes the Fire of Consciousness as continuing to partially and imperfectly consume sense-impressions even when subdued and debilitated in the ordinary state of consciousness, but as capable of assimilating the entire universe when intensified. See J. Singh trans:, Pratyabhij��-hrdayam (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass), pp.87–90 (stra 14–15). The burning of the Kh�ndava (‘sweetmeat’) forest by Fire assuming the form of a gluttonous brahman synthesizes the Vid�shaka and the destructive cosmogonic symbolisms through sacrificial terminology in the Mah�bh�rata; see Jacques Scheuer, Shiva dans le Mah�bh�rata, Biblioth�que de l’Ecole des Hautes Etudes, Sciences Religieuses, vol. 84 (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1982), chap. 4. For the derivation of the Trika fire-symbolism from the Vedic Agnihotra sacrifice, see E. Ch. Visuvalingam, "Union and Unity in Hindu Tantrism," in Hananya Goodman, ed., Between Jerusalem and Benares: Comparative Studies in Judaism and Hinduism (Albany: SUNY, 1994), pp.195-222.