The greatest figure
in the Trika school was the tenth-century philosopher and aesthetic theorist
Abhinavagupta.
The Trika school was a Kashmiri religious community whose
members were devotees (bhakta) of the god Shiva; the greatest figure in the
Trika school was the tenth-century philosopher and aesthetic theorist
Abhinavagupta.
Trika Shaivism is a tantric tradition—that is, a secret,
ritual-based religious practice—whose philosophical foundations combine theism
and monism.
Theism holds that a divine being is the universe's Supreme
Reality, while monism holds that a more abstract principle is the foundation of
all reality.
The deity Shiva, who is both Supreme God and the source of
emana tions from which the material cosmos is generated, is the single genuine
reality for Trika Shaivism.
The process of "recognition" (pratyabhijna), in
which one knows that the whole cosmos is nothing but a manifestation of Shiva
alone, leads to final soul emancipation (moksha).
Here, one "recognizes" something that has always
been true but had been obscured by a misunderstanding up until that point.
More information can be found in Paul Eduardo Muller-1989
Ortega's book, The Triadic Heart of Siva.
Tantra and Shaiva are two other terms for the same thing.
