Trika Pūjā The Common Trika Initiation into the Rule ( samayadīkṣā ) Compiled from chapter 15 of the Tantrāloka, ‘The light on and of the Tantras’ by Abhinavagupta Abhinavagupta built a system focused on ritual and the non-discursive consciousness that precedes and sustains it. He built it within the bastions of Trika even as he transmitted the Trika teachings. This Trika he called Anuttaratrika. From this perspective, the Tantrāloka contains a full program of Anuttara Trika doctrine and practice. Certainly, it was Abhinavagupta’s intention for it to serve as the basis for the future development of Trika Śaivism. But this should not distract us from Abhinava’s other intention, which he clearly placed to the fore and that was to write a paddhati . The exaltation of salvific knowledge and the internalization of ritual in a general sense and Abhinava’s rich exegesis of ritual specifically, has served to distract the tradition over the centuries from what was undoubtably one of Abhinava’s central concerns, namely, Trika ritual.