Modern scholars tend to see the Shiva Purana as a layered, evolving composition that took shape over several centuries, rather than as a single, unified work by one author. Its core is usually placed within the broader Purāṇic phase of Hindu literature, and the text clearly bears the marks of multiple authors and editorial strata. This composite nature allows it to preserve earlier materials while also reflecting later theological and ritual developments within Śaivism. The result is a scripture that simultaneously looks back to older traditions and forward to more systematized medieval forms of devotion.

Within this frame, the text is read as a key witness to the consolidation of Śaiva identity amid a dynamic religious landscape. It presents Śiva as the supreme deity, yet does so in conversation with other currents such as Vaiṣṇavism, Śāktism, and various local cults. Scholars note how it integrates Vedic deities and sacrificial ideas, epic narratives, and regional Rudra- or Paśupati-like cults, including liṅga worship and cremation-ground imagery. This weaving together of strands is interpreted as part of a larger process of integrating local and tribal practices into a pan-Indic, Sanskritic Śaiva framework.

The Shiva Purana is also approached as a document of ritual and temple culture. Its detailed accounts of liṅga worship, vows, festivals such as Mahāśivarātri, and sacred sites are seen as reflections of a maturing, temple-centered religion with established priestly lineages and sacred geography. In this way, the text not only mirrors existing practices but also helps to standardize and legitimize them, providing a scriptural backbone for regional Śaiva communities and their pilgrimage networks.

At the theological level, scholars discern a sustained effort to systematize Śaiva thought. The Purana articulates Śiva as both transcendent and immanent, frames the cosmos as his play, and explores cycles of creation and dissolution, as well as the relationship between Śiva, Śakti, and the universe. These themes are read in dialogue with contemporaneous philosophical systems, and the portrayal of goddesses such as Pārvatī and Durgā, along with the emphasis on Śiva–Śakti unity, is often linked to evolving Śākta and tantric currents, even when the text itself remains within a recognizably Purāṇic idiom.

Finally, the work is treated as a social and ethical mirror of its milieu. Its teachings on dharma, caste, kingship, and household duties are understood as adapting orthodox social ideals to a devotional Śaiva setting, aligning with a broader bhakti movement that foregrounds personal devotion. At the same time, modern textual study highlights the existence of multiple recensions, with notable regional variations in content and structure. This plurality is taken as evidence that different Śaiva communities reshaped the Purana to reflect their own deities, legends, and liturgical needs, allowing the text to function as both a unifying canon and a flexible vessel for diverse local expressions of devotion to Śiva.