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This is the printer-friendly version of: http: / / www.berzinarchives.com / web / en / archives / study / asian_non-buddhist_traditions / indian_non-buddhist_traditions / basic_tenets_samkhya_yoga_schools.html Alexander Berzin June 2004, revised May 2008
Origins
The Samkhya (grangs-can-pa) school of Indian philosophy traces itself from the ancient sage Kapila (Drang-srong Ser-skya), author of The Numbered Items Sutra (Samkhya Sutra). This sutra, however, was compiled only in the fourteenth century CE. The earliest Samkhya text to appear, however, was Verses on the Numbered Items (Skt. Samkhya Karika), by Ishvarakrshna, in the fifth century CE. The main commentary was by Vacaspati, written in the ninth century CE. The Yoga school began slightly later, at the end of the fifth century CE, with the Yoga Sutra by Patanjali. Its main commentary was by Vyasa, written at the beginning of the sixth century CE. This school shares the basic tenets of Samkhya, but adds to the system the supreme god Ishvara (dbang-po), equivalent to Shiva.
Primal Matter
The Samkhya-Yoga system divides all knowable phenomena into 25 classes (de-nyid, Skt. tattva). Of the 25 classes of knowable phenomena, 24 comprise all forms of material phenomena (bem-po). They are known collectively as primal matter (gtso-bo, Skt. pradhana) or natural matter (rang-bzhin, Skt. prakrti), which is counted as one of the 24. Primal matter is made up of three universal constituents (yon-tan, Skt. guna) intertwined like rope. They are the components of primal matter and not qualities distinct from primal matter. The three, in Sanskrit, are: sattva (snying-stobs), referring in different contexts to luminosity, lightness, strength, and pleasure rajas (rdul), referring to activity, motion, and pain tamas (mun-pa), referring to obscurity, darkness, heaviness, and a neutral feeling. The three universal constituents are in equilibrium. As a whole, then, primal matter or the natural state is permanent, in the sense of being static, unchanging, and eternal all-pervasive the deepest true phenomenon.
Persons
A person (skyes-bu, Skt. purusha), soul or self (bdag, Skt. atman), perceiver (shes-pa), or knower (rig-pa) is the self that Buddhists refute. It is equivalent to mere consciousness and is totally passive. There are a manifold number of individual selves and, as mere passive consciousness, their qualities are that each one is: permanent, in the sense of being unchanging, static, and eternal all-pervasive with the universe partless and so not made up of the three universal constituents like material phenomena are the conscious experiencer of the results of karmic action not the agent of actions, since the body is - a soul cannot do anything since that would mean it changes not the creator of the perturbations of primal matter.
Dharma.
legs (rkang-pa, Skt. pada) to walk a sexual organ ('doms, Skt. prastha) to expel urine an anus (rkub, Skt. payu) to expel excrement. These five do not refer to the gross matter of the hands and so forth, but to subtle forms of matter or energy that allow for the gross matter of the action organs to perform their functions.
Liberation
Persons or souls suffer through repeated rebirth (Skt. samsara) due to unawareness (Skt. avidya, ignorance) that the person or soul is not the same as the physical faculty for sentience - the physical medium through which a person manifests. Unawareness is a lack of knowing, not incorrect knowing. It is a fault of insufficient knowledge, not a fault of being confused. Liberation occurs when a soul gains the full knowledge and understanding that it is not the same as the physical faculty for sentience. With liberation, a person or soul becomes totally disengaged and separate (Skt. kevala, isolated) from primal matter and all its perturbations. Since it is only through a person's entanglement with a physical faculty for sentience that it experiences anything (suffering, happiness, or any result of karma), a liberated disengaged person is just pure consciousness with no object at all. Note that the Samkhya position is significantly different from
Cognition, the Internal Agent, and the Subtle Body 5
the Jain assertion that the liberated, disengaged soul is omniscient the Nyaya-Vaisheshika position that it lacks consciousness the Advaitya Vedanta assertion that it is in a state beyond being conscious of everything or conscious of nothing.
Liberation