him was filled with spiritual fervor and had taken Abhinavagupta as their spiritual master. Such a supporting group of family and friends was equally necessary as his personal qualities of genius, to complete a work of the magnitude of Tantrāloka. Ancestors By Abhinavagupta's own account, his most remote known ancestor was called Atrigupta, born in Madhyadeśa, i.e. the Middle Country. Born in Madhyadeśa he travelled to Kashmir at the request of the Kayastha king Lalitāditya, around year 740 CE. Masters Abhinavagupta is famous for his voracious thirst for knowledge. To study he took many teachers (as many as fifteen), both mystical philosophers and scholars. He approached Vaiṣṇavas, Buddhists, Śiddhānta Śaivists, and the Trika scholars. Among the most prominent of his teachers, he enumerates four, two of whom were Vāmanātha, who instructed him in dualistic Śaivism, and Bhūtirāja in the dualist/nondualist school. Besides being the teacher of the famous Abhinavagupta, Bhūtirāja was also the father of two eminent scholars. Lakṣmaṇagupta, a direct disciple of Utpaladeva, in the lineage of Trayambaka, was highly respected by Abhinavagupta and taught him all the schools of monistic thought: Krama, Trika, and Pratyabhijña (except Kula). Śambhunātha taught him the fourth school (Ardha-trayambaka). This school is in fact Kaula, and it was emanated from Trayambaka's daughter. For Abhinavagupta, Śambhunātha was the most admired guru. Describing the greatness of his master, he compared Śambhunātha to the Sun, in his power to dispel ignorance from the heart, and, in another place, with "the Moon shining over the ocean of Trika knowledge." Abhinavagupta received Kaula initiation through Śambhunātha's wife (acting as a dūtī or conduit). The energy of this initiation is transmitted and sublimated into the heart and finally into consciousness. Such a method is difficult but very rapid and is reserved for those who shed their mental limitations and are pure. It was Śambhunātha who requested he write Tantrāloka. As guru, he had a profound influence in the structure of Tantrāloka and in the life of its creator, Abhinavagupta. As many as twelve more of his principal teachers are enumerated by name but without details. It is believed that Abhinavagupta had more secondary teachers. Moreover, during his life he had accumulated a large number of texts from which he quoted in his magnum opus, in his desire to create a syncretic, all-inclusive system, where the contrasts of different scriptures could be resolved by integration into a superior perspective. Lifestyle