The Kaulājñānanirṇaya is traditionally attributed to Matsyendranātha, also known in variant forms as Machhendranath or Macchindranātha. Within the Kaula and Nātha milieus, he stands as a foundational figure, often regarded as the first human guru of the Nātha lineage and a key master of Kaula Tantra. Traditional narratives present him as a semi-historical or semi-mythical sage, whose life story is interwoven with legend to such an extent that firm biographical details are difficult to extract. Nonetheless, the consistent attribution of this esoteric manual to his name signals the centrality of his authority for Kaula doctrine and practice.

Within the broader spiritual landscape, Matsyendranātha is revered as one of the earliest and most important siddhas of the Nātha tradition and is also counted among the great mahāsiddhas in Vajrayāna Buddhism. He is portrayed as having received direct instruction from Śiva (Ādinātha), thereby serving as the conduit through which Kaula gnosis and Nātha teachings entered the human sphere. In many accounts he is remembered as the guru of Gorakṣanātha, who later became another pivotal figure in the Nātha current. Through this lineage connection, Matsyendranātha is associated not only with Kaula and Yoginī-oriented Śākta-Śaiva Tantra, but also with the early formation of haṭha yoga and related yogic and tantric disciplines.

The historical setting of Matsyendranātha is usually placed around the early phase of codified Kaula and Nātha Tantra, though precise dates remain uncertain. Hagiographical traditions link him with regions such as Bengal and Assam, and more broadly with the northeastern and Himalayan tantric sphere, but these geographical associations are better read as sacred memory than as strict historical record. Modern scholarly perspectives tend to accept his traditional authorship of the Kaulājñānanirṇaya while recognizing that, like many tantric works, the text may bear traces of later redaction layered upon an earlier core. Taken together, these strands of tradition portray Matsyendranātha as a seminal yet elusive master, whose name gathers around it the formative currents of Kaula doctrine, Nātha yoga, and esoteric Śaiva-Śākta practice.