Some notes on the Kaula Upanishad – I
I’ve had a copy of the Kaula Upanishad, as translated by into English by the late Mike Magee in 1995, kicking around on various computers for a while now, but only recently have thought to take a close look at it. As Kaula texts go, I suspect it is rather a late one. A Sanskrit edition was published by Sir John Woodroffe in 1922, so it has been available for a good while now. The only commentary I’m aware of is by the eighteenth-century luminary Bhāskararāya. As far as I know, it has not received any scholarly attention. What follows are some brief notes on this text up to verse 7. I’m drawing on Mike’s translation, presented first, with alternatives for some of the other verses. I freely admit that this has been hard going, revealing just how fragmentary my understanding of this text is. Probably best then, to take everything with a pinch of salt.
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