A History of Indian Philosophy, Vol. 1, Surendranath Dasgupta [ebook reader with android os .txt] 📗

take place in three lines by three different kinds of undulations representing the sattva preponderance, rajas preponderance and tama preponderance. This state when the mahat is disturbed by the three parallel tendencies of a preponderance of tamas, rajas and sattva's called aha@mkâra, and the above three tendencies are respectiviy called tâmasika aha@mkâra or bhûtâdi, râjasika or taijasa aha@mâra, and vaikârika aha@mkâra. The râjasika aha@mkâra cannot make a new preponderance by itself; it only

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helps (sahakâri) the transformations of the sattva preponderance and the tamas preponderance. The development of the former preponderance, as is easy to see, is only the assumption of a more and more determinate character of the buddhi, for we remember that buddhi itself has been the resulting transformation of a sattva preponderance. Further development with the help of rajas on the line of sattva development could only take place when the buddhi as mind determined itself in specific ways. The first development of the buddhi on this line is called sâttvika or vaikârika aha@mkâra. This aha@mkâra represents the development in buddhi to produce a consciousness-stuff as I or rather "mine," and must thus be distinguished from the first stage as buddhi the function of which is a mere understanding and general datun as thisness.

The ego or aha@mkâra (abhimâna-dravya) is the specific expression of the general consciousness which takes experience as mine. The function of the ego is therefore called abhimâna (self-assertion). From this again come the five cognitive senses of vision, touch, smell, taste, and hearing, the five cognitive senses of speech, handling, foot-movement, the ejective sense and the generative sense; the prâ@nas (bio-motor force) which help both conation and cognition are but aspects of buddhi-movement as life. The individual aha@mkâras and senses are related to the individual buddhis by the developing sattva determinations from which they had come into being. Each buddhi with its own group of aka@mkâra (ego) and sense-evolutes thus forms a microcosm separate from similar other buddhis with their associated groups. So far therefore as knowledge is subject to sense-influence and the ego, it is different for each individual, but so far as a general mind (kâra@na buddhi) apart from sense knowledge is concerned, there is a community of all buddhis in the buddhitattva. Even there however each buddhi is separated from other buddhis by its own peculiarly associated ignorance (avidyâ). The buddhi and its sattva evolutes of aha@mkâra and the senses are so related that though they are different from buddhi in their functions, they are all comprehended in the buddhi, and mark only its gradual differentiations and modes. We must again remember in this connection the doctrine of refilling, for as buddhi exhausts its part in giving rise to aha@mkâra, the deficiency of buddhi is made good by prak@rti; again as aha@mkâra partially exhausts itself in generating sense-faculties, the deficiency

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is made good by a refilling from the buddhi. Thus the change and wastage of each of the stadia are always made good and kept constant by a constant refilling from each higher state and finally from prak@rti.

The Tanmâtras and the Paramâ@nus [Footnote ref 1].

The other tendency, namely that of tamas, has to be helped by the liberated rajas of aha@mkâra, in order to make itself preponderant, and this state in which the tamas succeeds in overcoming the sattva side which was so preponderant in the buddhi, is called bhûtâdi. From this bhûtâdi with the help of rajas are generated the tanmâtras, the immediately preceding causes of the gross elements. The bhûtâdi thus represents only the intermediate stage through which the differentiations and regroupings of tamas reals in the mahat proceed for the generation of the tanmâtras. There has been some controversy between Sâ@mkhya and Yoga as to whether the tanmâtras are generated from the mahat or from aha@mkâra. The situation becomes intelligible if we remember that evolution here does not mean coming out or emanation, but increasing differentiation in integration within the evolving whole. Thus the regroupings of tamas reals marks the differentiation which takes place within the mahat but through its stage as bhûtâdi. Bhûtâdi is absolutely homogeneous and inert, devoid of all physical and chemical characters except quantum or mass. The second stadium tanmâtra represents subtle matter, vibratory, impingent, radiant, instinct with potential energy. These "potentials" arise from the unequal aggregation of the original mass-units in different proportions and collocations with an unequal distribution of the original energy (rajas). The tanmâtras possess something more than quantum of mass and energy; they possess physical characters, some of them penetrability, others powers of impact or pressure, others radiant heat, others again capability of viscous and cohesive attraction [Footnote ref. 2].

In intimate relation with those physical characters they also possess the potentials of the energies represented by sound, touch, colour, taste, and smell; but, being subtle matter, they are devoid

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[Footnote 1: I have accepted in this section and in the next many of the translations of Sanskrit terms and expressions of Dr Seal and am largely indebted to him for his illuminating exposition of this subject as given in Ray's Hindu Chemistry. The credit of explaining Sâ@mkhya physics, in the light of the text belongs entirely to him.]

[Footnote 2: Dr Seal's Positive Sciences of the Ancient Hindus.]

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of the peculiar forms which these "potentials" assume in particles of gross matter like the atoms and their aggregates. In other words, the potentials lodged in subtle matter must undergo peculiar transformations by new groupings or collocations before they can act as sensory stimuli as gross matter, though in the minutest particles thereof the sensory stimuli may be infra-sensible (atîndriya but not anudbhûta) [Footnote ref 1].

Of the tanmatras the s'abda or âkâs'a tanmâtra (the sound-potential) is first generated directly from the bhûtâdi. Next comes the spars'a or the vâyu tanmâtra (touch-potential) which is generated by the union of a unit of tamas from bhûtâdi with the âkâs'a tanmâtra. The rûpa tanmâtra (colour-potential) is generated similarly by the accretion of a unit of tamas from bhûtâdi; the rasa tanmâtra (taste-potential) or the ap tunmâtra is also similarly formed. This ap tanmâtra again by its union with a unit of tamas from bhûtâdi produces the gândha tanmâtra (smell-potential) or the k@siti tanmâtra [Footnote ref 2]. The difference of tanmâtras or infra-atomic units and atoms (paramâ@nu) is this, that the tanmâtras have only the potential power of affecting our senses, which must be grouped and regrouped in a particular form to constitute a new existence as atoms before they can have the power of affecting our senses. It is important in this connection to point out that the classification of all gross objects as k@siti, ap, tejas, marut and vyoman is not based upon a chemical analysis, but from the points of view of the five senses through which knowledge of them could be brought home to us. Each of our senses can only apprehend a particular quality and thus five different ultimate substances are said to exist corresponding to the five qualities which may be grasped by the five senses. In accordance with the existence of these five elements, the existence of the five potential states or tanmâtras was also conceived to exist as the ground of the five gross forms.

The five classes of atoms are generated from the tanmâtras as follows: the sound-potential, with accretion of rudiment matter from bhûtâdi generates the âkâsa-atom. The touch-potentials combine with the vibratory particles (sound-potential) to generate the

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[Footnote 1: Dr Seal's Positive Sciences of the Ancient Hindus.]

[Footnote 2: There were various ways in which the genesis of tanmâtras and atoms were explained in literatures other than Sâ@mkhya; for some account of it see Dr Seal's Positive Sciences of the Ancient Hindus.]

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vâyu-atom. The light-and-heat potentials combine with touch-potentials and sound-potentials to produce the tejas-atom. The taste-potentials combine with light-and-heat potentials, touch-potentials and sound-potentials to generate the ap-atom and the smell-potentials combine with the preceding potentials to generate the earth-atom. The âkâs'a-atom possesses penetrability, the vâyu-atom impact or mechanical pressure, the tejas-atom radiant heat and light, the ap-atom viscous attraction and the earth-atom cohesive attraction. The âkâsa we have seen forms the transition link from the bhûtâdi to the tanmâtra and from the tanmâtra to the atomic production; it therefore deserves a special notice at this stage. Sâ@mkhya distinguishes between a kâra@na-âkâs'a and kâryâkâs'a. The kâra@na-âkâs'a (non-atomic and all-pervasive) is the formless tamas—the mass in prak@rti or bhûtâdi; it is indeed all-pervasive, and is not a mere negation, a mere unoccupiedness (âvara@nâbhâva) or vacuum [Footnote ref 1]. When energy is first associated with this tamas element it gives rise to the sound-potential; the atomic âkâs'a is the result of the integration of the original mass-units from bhûtâdi with this sound-potential (s'abda tanmâtra). Such an âkâs'a-atom is called the kâryâkâs'a; it is formed everywhere and held up in the original kâra@na âkâs'a as the medium for the development of vâyu atoms. Being atomic it occupies limited space.

The aha@mkâra and the five tanmâtras are technically called avis'e@sa or indeterminate, for further determinations or differentiations of them for the formation of newer categories of existence are possible. The eleven senses and the five atoms are called vis'e@sa, i.e. determinate, for they cannot further be so determined as to form a new category of existence. It is thus that the course of evolution which started in the prak@rti reaches its furthest limit in the production of the senses on the one side and the atoms on the other. Changes no doubt take place in bodies having atomic constitution, but these changes are changes of quality due to spatial changes in the position of the atoms or to the introduction of new atoms and their re-arrangement. But these are not such that a newer category of existence could be formed by them which was substantially different from the combined atoms.

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[Footnote 1: Dr B.N. Seal in describing this âkâs'a says "Âkâs'a corresponds in some respects to the ether of the physicists and in others to what may be called proto-atom (protyle)." Ray's History of Hindu Chemistry, p. 88.]

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The changes that take place in the atomic constitution of things certainly deserve to be noticed. But before we go on to this, it will be better to enquire about the principle of causation according to which the Sâ@mkhya-Yoga evolution should be comprehended or interpreted.

Principle of Causation and Conservation of Energy [Footnote ref 1].

The question is raised, how can the prak@rti supply the deficiencies made in its evolutes by the formation of other evolutes from them? When from mahat some tanmâtras have evolved, or when from the tanmâtras some atoms have evolved, how can the deficiency in mahat and the tanmâtras be made good by the prak@rti?

Or again, what is the principle that guides the transformations that take place in the atomic stage when one gross body, say milk, changes into curd, and so on? Sâ@mkhya says that "as the total energy remains the same while the world is constantly evolving, cause and effect are only more or less evolved forms of the same ultimate Energy. The sum of effects exists in the sum of causes in a potential form. The grouping or collocation alone changes, and this brings on the manifestation of the latent powers of the gu@nas, but without creation of anything new. What is called the (material) cause is only the power which is efficient in the production or rather the vehicle of the power. This power is the unmanifested (or potential) form of the Energy set free (udbhûta-v@rtti) in the effect. But the concomitant conditions are necessary to call forth the so-called material cause into activity [Footnote ref 2]." The appearance of an effect (such as the manifestation of the figure of the statue in the marble block by the causal efficiency of the sculptor's art) is only its passage from potentiality to actuality and the concomitant conditions (sahakâri-s'akti) or efficient cause (nimitta-kâra@na, such as the sculptor's art) is a sort of mechanical help or instrumental help to this passage or the transition [Footnote ref 3]. The refilling from prak@rti thus means nothing more than this, that by the inherent teleology of the prak@rti, the reals there are so collocated as to be transformed into mahat as those of the mahat have been collocated to form the bhûtâdi or the tanmâtras.

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[Footnote 1: Vyâsabhâ@sya and Yogavârttika, IV. 3; Tattvavais'âradî,
IV. 3.]

[Footnote 2: Ray, History of Hindu Chemistry, p. 72.]

[Footnote 3: Ibid. p. 73.]

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Yoga however explains this more vividly on the basis of transformation of the liberated potential energy. The sum of material causes potentially contains the energy manifested in the sum of effects. When the effectuating condition is added to the sum of material conditions in a given collocation, all that happens is that a stimulus is imparted which removes the arrest, disturbs the relatively stable equilibrium, and brings on a liberation of energy together with a fresh collocation(gu@nasannives'avis'e@sa). As the owner of an adjacent field in transferring water from one field to another of the same or lower level has only to remove the obstructing