Bhairava Stava of Abhinavagupta — opening verse

Abhinavagupta (c. 950–1016) is the great systematiser of Trika, the Kashmir Shaiva school, and the author of the Tantraloka. This short stava, transmitted in his Stotravali, is where his philosophy is most compactly devotional. The first line is a Trika thesis in four words: Bhairava pervades not 'everything' in the abstract but bhāva-viśeṣa, each particular thing in its distinctness — and is cinmaya, made of consciousness, one, endless, beginningless. Nothing here is a fierce guardian at a shrine door. This is the Absolute. The last phrase is the one worth carrying away. Tvanmaya-cittatayā — 'by way of a mind made of you'. The worship is not offered to Bhairava from outside; the instrument of worship is itself already him. Later verses of the same hymn turn to address Death directly and tell him to put away his terrible look, on the stated ground that the speaker is made of Bhairava's own power and therefore does not fear at all.