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The Soteriological Role of the ṛṣi Kapila, According to the Yuktidīpikā

James Kimball

jskimball@hotmail.com

Kimball, J. (2013). “The Soteriological Role of the ṛṣi Kapila, According to the Yuktidīpikā.” Journal of Indian Philosophy 41(6): 603-614. The final publication is available at http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10781-013-9199-y .

Abstract

A basic teaching of classical Sāṃkhya is that repeated embodiment is the result of an

individual’s ignorance of the distinction between prakṛti and puruṣa. The only exception to

this is the ṛṣi Kapila, legendary founder of Sāṃkhya, who was born with innate knowledge of

this distinction. It is this knowledge that leads to liberation from saṃsāra when it is acquired. This brings up the question, why was Kapila incarnated in the first place? If he already

possessed this knowledge, what need did he have for further experience of prakṛti’s activity?

The classical commentators on the Sāṃkhyakārikā give various accounts of the nature and

origin of Kapila, but they do not directly address this question. However, the evidence of one commentary, the Yuktidīpikā, does provide clues to the reason behind Kapila’s incarnation. In

this article, I argue that the author of the Yuktidīpikā views Kapila as a direct embodiment of

prakṛti’s soteriological potential for all puruṣas.

According to classical Sāṃkhya philosophy, everything that we experience in the phenomenal

world is an aspect of the activity of prakṛti, the principle of primordial materiality. The

motivation behind this activity, however, lies in the presence of countless individual puruṣas.

The term puruṣa, literally meaning “man,” signifies in Sāṃkhya the principle of pure

consciousness lying behind the experience of every individual. A puruṣa is completely

passive; it does not act, it only watches the activity of prakṛti. This activity encompasses the

body, sense faculties, and even the intellectual faculties of the individual. We mistakenly

identify with these elements of experience; in reality they belong to the objective realm, while

what we really are is pure subjectivity.

The relationship between prakṛti and puruṣa can be illustrated by the image of an

audience of puruṣas in a cinema, watching a screen on which is projected the activity of

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prakṛti.1 The objectives of this film are two: first, the entertainment of the puruṣas, and second,

the realization of the nature of the viewing experience. That is, at first prakṛti’s activity takes

the form of escapism, in which each puruṣa identifies himself completely with the actions on

screen, but its ultimate objective is to attain a kind of self-reflexivity, drawing attention to the

fact that this is actually only a film, at which point the film ends and the puruṣas are left in a

darkened cinema; that is, they are liberated from the viewing experience.

This analogy is somewhat complicated by the fact that prakṛti functions differently with

regard to each particular puruṣa. That is, despite the fact that there is only one screen, the

viewing experience is so subjective that every puruṣa sees something different, depending upon

which stage in the process of realization it has reached. In fact, this process usually requires

multiple viewings. Each phenomenal reincarnation of an individual can be thought of as a

return to the cinema for another viewing. Prakṛti writes a new character into its film for the

benefit of each puruṣa entering the cinema. If the character on screen with whom a puruṣa

identifies is killed off before the realization of separation sets in, the puruṣa leaves briefly and

returns to identify with a new character. When eventually the self-reflexive aspect of the film

sinks in, and the puruṣa ceases to identify with any of the characters, the film ends once and

for all for that particular puruṣa, although it continues for others.

This understanding of the process central to Sāṃkhya meets with an interesting problem

when we consider one of the characters in prakṛti’s film. The Sāṃkhya texts treat the ṛṣi Kapila

as what we might call the leading actor in this film. Kapila is known to the tradition as the

founder of Sāṃkhya philosophy and is said to have been born with innate knowledge of the

relationship between prakṛti and puruṣa. Since it is this knowledge that is held to result in the

1 The core text of classical Sāṃkhya, the Sāṃkhyakārikā, uses a similar image, which I have updated: “Just as a

dancer, having been seen by the audience, ceases from dancing, so does prakṛti cease, having made herself

manifest to the puruṣa.” (Sāṃkhyakārikā 59: raṅgasya darśayitvā nivartate nartakī yathā nṛtyāt / puruṣasya tathātmānaṃ prakāśya vinivartate prakṛtiḥ //) Note that prakṛti is a feminine noun, and although this refers an

impersonal principle, the Sāṃkhya texts often personify prakṛti as a woman (in contrast to puruṣa, literally “man”)

in the metaphors that are used to illustrate Sāṃkhya doctrine.

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liberation of the puruṣa identified with a particular character in prakṛti’s film, we might ask

why Kapila was written into the film in the first place. That is, if the puruṣa with which Kapila

is associated has no need for further experience of prakṛti’s activity, what is the purpose of

Kapila’s incarnation? I will argue that the evidence of one Sāṃkhya text, the Yuktidīpikā,

suggests a clear explanation of Kapila’s role on the Sāṃkhya screen.

The term ṛṣi is usually applied to individuals with intuitive access to eternal, revealed

knowledge, whose role is to manifest or disseminate this knowledge, usually in the form of the

Veda. The earliest clear references to a ṛṣi or ṛṣis called Kapila come in the Mahābhārata,

where Kapila figures are included in lists of Vedic-style ṛṣis, identified with various deities,

and sometimes associated with the practices of renunciation and non-violence, as well as with

certain prototypically Sāṃkhya philosophical ideas.2

By the time of the normative formulation of the Sāṃkhya system in Īśvarakṛṣṇa’s

Sāṃkhyakārikā (ca. 350-550 C.E.) and its commentaries, Kapila had come to be definitively

regarded as the paramarṣi, the “supreme ṛṣi,” the founder of Sāṃkhya and initiator of the

tradition of Sāṃkhya teachers:

This secret [knowledge] for the sake of the puruṣa—wherein is considered the existence, origination, and dissolution of beings—has been expounded by the

supreme ṛṣi. This purifying, foremost [knowledge] the sage gave with

compassion to Āsuri; Āsuri likewise to Pañcaśikha; by him the doctrine was expanded. Handed down by a succession of disciples, it has been condensed in

āryā [verses] by the noble-minded Īśvarakṛṣṇa, having fully ascertained the

established truth.3

Elsewhere we are told that Kapila and the doctrine he expounded had rather unique origins.

The Gauḍapādabhāṣya, an early commentary on the Sāṃkhyakārikā, quotes a verse including

2 Jacobsen (2008, pp. 9-24) has provided a good survey of the early appearances of Kapila, and Larson and Bhattacharya (1987, pp. 1-18) give an overview of the early development of Sāṃkhya ideas. 3 puruṣārtham idaṃ guhyaṃ paramarṣiṇā samākhyātam /

sthityutpattipralayāś cintyante yatra bhūtānām //

etat pavitram agryaṃ munir āsuraye ’nukampayā pradadau /

āsurir api pañcaśikhāya tena ca bahudhā kṛtaṃ tantram // śiṣyaparamparayāgatam īśvarakṛṣṇena caitad āryābhiḥ /

saṃkṣiptam āryamatinā samyag vijñāya siddhāntam // (Sāṃkhyakārikā 69-71)

Note: all translations of passages from primary texts are my own.

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Kapila in a list of seven ṛṣis and explains that Kapila was born with, among other qualities,

innate Sāṃkhya knowledge, which he transmitted to his disciple, Āsuri:

In this world, there was a glorious son of Brahmā named Kapila, as here follows: Sanaka, Sanandana, and the third, Sanātana,

Āsuri, Kapila, Voḍhu, and Pañcaśikha—

These seven great ṛṣis have been declared the sons of Brahmā. Kapila’s merit, knowledge, non-attachment, and lordliness were produced

simultaneously [with him]. Being born thus, seeing the world sinking in blind ignorance through the succession of transmigration, with true compassion he

conveyed to his kinsman Āsuri, a brāhmaṇa who desired to know, this

knowledge of the twenty-five principles—from the knowledge of which there is the destruction of pain.4

In this context, “merit, knowledge, dispassion, and lordliness” refer to the four conditions

(bhāvas) of the intellect characterized by the constituent quality of sattva, according to

Sāṃkhya doctrine. “Knowledge” (jñāna) refers primarily to the knowledge of the distinction

between prakṛti and puruṣa, which leads to liberation. This creates an interpretative problem

for us, since it is a basic Sāṃkhya doctrine that incarnation is the result of the condition of

ignorance (ajñāna).5 Kapila is unique, according to the Sāṃkhya commentaries, in having

been born instead with knowledge.

In the above passage, though, Gauḍapāda emphasizes not only Kapila’s uniqueness but

also his kinship to other ṛṣis. Gauḍapāda’s list of seven ṛṣis may have been adapted from a

similar list found in the Mahābhārata:

Sana, Sanatsujāta, Sanaka, together with Sanandana,

Sanatkumāra, Kapila, and the seventh, Sanātana— These seven ṛṣis are declared the mental sons of Brahmā,

Whose discrimination has come of its own accord, who dwell in the

renunciatory dharma.6

4 iha bhagavān brahmasutaḥ kapilo nāma / tadyathā—

sanakaś ca sanandanaś ca tṛtīyaś ca sanātanaḥ /

āsuriḥ kapilaś caiva voḍhuḥ pañcaśikhas tathā /

ity ete brahmaṇaḥ putrāḥ sapta proktā maharṣayaḥ //

kapilasya sahotpannāni dharmo jñānaṃ vairāgyam aiśvaryaṃ ceti / evaṃ sa utpannaḥ sannandhe tamasi majjaj

jagad ālokya saṃsārapāramparyeṇa satkāruṇyo jijñāsamānāya āsurisagotrāya brāhmaṇāyedaṃ

pañcaviṃśatitattvānāṃ jñānam uktavān / yasya jñānād duḥkhakṣayo bhavati / (Gauḍapādabhāṣya on Sāṃkhyakārikā 1, p. 1, ll. 13-21) 5 “By means of knowledge is liberation; from the opposite is bondage.” (Sāṃkhyakārikā 44cd: jñānena cāpavargo

viparyayād iṣyate bandhaḥ //) 6 sanaḥ sanatkujātaś ca sanakaḥ sasanandanaḥ /

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Kapila’s name certainly stands out among this group of ṛṣis, and Gauḍapāda’s incorporation

into this list of Āsuri, Voḍhu, and Pañcaśikha, all reputed to be early Sāṃkhya teachers, is

likely an attempt to further validate the Sāṃkhya lineage, by ascribing to them the innate

knowledge or insight possessed by ṛṣis.

This tendency toward the legitimization of the lineage of Sāṃkhya teachers becomes

more pronounced in the Yuktidīpikā (ca. 600-700 C.E.), a slightly later, anonymous

commentary on the Sāṃkhyakārikā. The author of this text, like Gauḍapāda, tells us that Kapila

was born with innate knowledge, merit, dispassion, and lordliness. The commentator also

specifies that Kapila was born first of all beings in the world:

The glorious supreme ṛṣi, born first in the world, having ascertained the glorious

Āsuri’s desire to know and his attainment of the successive particular virtues, expounded [this system].7

The supreme ṛṣi is the glorious sage Kapila, born first in the world, with a body

possessed of innate merit, knowledge, non-attachment, and lordliness.8

The significance of the phrase “born first in the world” is made clear elsewhere in the

Yuktidīpikā. In the context of a discussion of the bodies of devas, the commentator elevates

Kapila to an even higher status than he was given by Gauḍapāda, placing him on a par with

Brahmā and above Brahmā’s sons:

The bodies of devas are of four kinds: due to the anugraha of primordial

Materiality (pradhāna, i.e. prakṛti in its unmanifest state), like those of the

supreme ṛṣi and Viriñca (Brahmā); due to their attainments (siddhis), like those

of Brahmā’s sons and grandsons; from mother and father, like those of the sons of Aditi and Kaśyapa; or from fathers alone, like that of Vasiṣṭha from Mitra

and Varuṇa.9

sanatkumāraḥ kapilaḥ saptamaś ca sanātanaḥ //

saptaite mānasāḥ proktā ṛṣayo brahmaṇaḥ sutāḥ /

svayamāgatavijñānā nivṛttaḥ dharmam āsthitāḥ // (Mahābhārata 12.327.64-65) 7 bhagavān viśvāgrajaḥ paramarṣir bhagavadāsurer jijñāsām upalabhyottaraguṇaviśeṣasampadaṃ ca

vyākhyātavān / (Yuktidīpikā on Sāṃkhyakārikā 1, p. 8, l. 19 – p. 9, l. 1) 8 paramarṣir bhagavān sāṃsiddhikair dharmajñānavairāgyaiśvaryair āviṣṭapiṇḍo viśvāgrajaḥ kapilamuniḥ / (Yuktidīpikā on Sāṃkhyakārikā 69, p. 267, ll. 13-14) 9 tatra devānāṃ caturvidhaṃ śarīraṃ pradhānānugrahād yathā paramarṣer viriñcasya ca, tatsiddhibhyo yathā

brahmaṇaḥ putrāṇāṃ tatputraputrāṇāṃ ca, mātāpitṛto yathāditeḥ kaśyapasya ca putrāṇāṃ kevalād vā yathā

pitṛto mitrāvaruṇābhyāṃ vasiṣṭhasya / (Yuktidīpikā on Sāṃkhyakārikā 39, p.228, ll. 12-15)

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The term anugraha can be translated as “favor” or “assistance,” but the precise significance of

the term in this context is not immediately clear and will be discussed below. It is clear from

this passage though, that the author of the Yuktidīpikā holds that Kapila and Brahmā are

considered equal in terms of the manner in which their bodies are produced. As Chakravarti

(1975, pp. 282-283) and Jacobsen (2008, p. 45) have noted, these two figures are significant

insofar as they fulfill the two primary purposes of prakṛti’s activity. Given the fact that Brahmā

initiates the physical creation of succeeding generations of beings, he fulfills the first purpose

of prakṛti, the experience of prakṛti’s activity (in the form of bodily incarnation) by various

puruṣas. Kapila, on the other hand, who was born with innate knowledge of the Sāṃkhya

principles (tattvas), would appear to fulfill the second purpose of prakṛti; by disseminating his

knowledge of the distinction between prakṛti and puruṣa, he effects the salvation of embodied

beings.

This association is made explicit in another passage of the Yuktidīpikā, which elaborates

on the initial phase of the production of bodies:

Before the manifestation of pradhāna, there was no possibility of merit

(dharma) and demerit (adharma), on account of the fact that these are qualities

of the intellect (buddhi), and [the intellect] is a product of pradhāna. Then, without those [bhāvas], [the constituent qualities of] sattva, etc., aiming at the

[dual] purpose of the experience of [the sensory objects of] sound, etc., and the

realization of the difference between the constituent qualities (guṇas) and

puruṣa, abiding in the state of the intellect, ego, subtle elements, faculties, and elements, produced bodies (śarīra) beginning with those of supreme ṛṣi and

Hiraṇyagarbha (Brahmā).10

Elsewhere in the Yuktidīpikā is found an explanation of the next phase of creation as the time

of the “six attainments,” which are explained as six supernatural forms of reproduction.

Following this begins the normal cycle of saṃsāra, in which rebirth is determined by dharma

10 prāk pradhānapravṛtter dharmādharmayor asambhavo buddhidharmatvāt tasyāś ca pradhānavikā<ra>tvāt /

tatas tadvyatiriktaṃ śabdādyupa<bhoga>lakṣaṇaṃ guṇapuruṣāntaropalabdhilakṣaṇaṃ cārtham uddiśya

sattvādayo mahadahaṃkāratanmātrendriyabhūtatvenāvasthāya paramarṣihiraṇyagarbhādīnāṃ śarīram

utpādayanti / (Yuktidīpikā on Sāṃkhyakārikā 52, p. 255, ll. 8-12).

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and adharma, and in which physical reproduction is of the kind with which we are now

familiar.11

These passages suggest that the bodies of Brahmā and Kapila were manifested by

pradhāna at the beginning of creation, obviously not in response to any dharma or adharma,

but in order to make possible for the various puruṣas the experience of prakṛti and then

liberation from prakṛti. With regard to the significance of the term anugraha in the previous

passage, as an explanation for this manifestation, there are two possible shades of meaning.

The term could refer simply to the “assistance” or “support” from pradhāna that enables Kapila

and Brahmā to become embodied (in the absence of any other cause for or means of

embodiment). Alternatively, the term could have the connotation of “favor,” in the sense of

the favor shown by prakṛti to all puruṣas by initiating the creation of beings through the

manifestation of Brahmā and the path to liberation through the manifestation of Kapila. I think

it is likely that the anugraha of prakṛti encompasses both of these senses, so I would like to

consider both shades of meaning successively, with reference to usages of the term in other

contexts.

In the former sense, of assistance in becoming embodied, a similar occurrence of the

term is found in the Pali canon. The Pali anuggaha occurs in the context of the Buddha’s

explanation of the four “nutriments” (āhāra):

These four, bhikkhus, are the nutriments for the maintenance of beings who have

been born or for the assistance (anuggaha) of [beings] seeking birth. Which

four? Material food, either gross or subtle, [sense] contact the second, intellectual intention the third, and consciousness the fourth.12

11 See Yuktidīpikā on Sāṃkhyakārikā 39cd, p. 229, ll. 4-17. 12 cattārome, bhikkhave, āhārā bhūtānaṃ vā sattānaṃ ṭhitiyā sambhavesīnaṃ vā anuggahāya / katame cattāro?

kabaḷīkāro āhāro – oḷāriko vā sukhumo vā, phasso dutiyo, manosañcetanā tatiyā, viññāṇaṃ catutthaṃ /

(Saṃyuttanikāya 2.1.2.1).

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The term here refers to the “assistance” or “support” which enables beings to become

embodied, which would accord well with the use of anugraha in the Yuktidīpikā passage,

although obviously the doctrinal and historical contexts are very different.

The term does occur in a similar sense in connection with the initial manifestation of

prakṛti in several Purāṇas. Following an account of the manifestation of the Sāṃkhya tattvas

in their standard order,13 the term anugraha is used to refer to pradhāna’s instrumentality in

producing the “egg of Brahmā”:

Having come together into conjunction with one another, mutually dependent, and characterized as a single aggregate, having entirely attained unity, on

account of being superintended (adhiṣṭhita) by puruṣa and by means of the assistance (anugraha) of pradhāna, those [tattvas] from intellect down to the

elements produced an egg.14

Here, as in the Yuktidīpikā passage in question, the use of anugraha seems to suggest that

unmanifest prakṛti has a certain instrumental power in combining the manifest elements that

have evolved out of it, in order to initiate the creation of physical beings. The reference in this

passage to the superintendence of puruṣa is also not in contradiction to the Sāṃkhya view. The

Yuktidīpikā, in fact, explains how superintendence (adhiṣṭhātṛtva) applies to puruṣa:

How is there superintendence (adhiṣṭhātṛtva) [on the part of puruṣa]? Just as

when someone is standing by as a witness of activity, the agent brings about the

effect in conformance with the desires of that [witness], so also does pradhāna. Accordingly as the puruṣa’s goal is fulfilled in activity and cessation, so does

[pradhāna] arrange itself through the situation of intellect, ego, subtle elements,

faculties, and elements into devas, human beings, animals, and inanimate

objects, not out of happenstance.15

13 E.g., Viṣṇupurāṇa 1.2.33-49 and Mārkaṇḍeyapurāṇa 45.35-51. This process differs from the orthodox classical

Sāṃkhya doctrine insofar as puruṣa and prakṛti, the two primary principles, originally develop out of Viṣṇu

himself as the supreme being (e.g., Viṣṇupurāṇa 1.2.15-16). 14 Viṣṇupurāṇa 1.2.53-54: sametyānyonyasaṃyogaṃ parasparasamāśrayāḥ / ekasaṃghātalakṣyāś ca

saṃprāpyaikyamaśeṣataḥ // puruṣādhiṣṭhitatvācca pradhānānugraheṇa ca / mahadādya viśeṣāntā

hyaṇḍamutpādayanti te //. Parallel passages are found at Mārkaṇḍeya 45.60b-62a; Padma 3.24b-26a; Kūrma

1.4.34-35; Vāyu 4.65-66. 15 adhiṣṭhātṛtvaṃ katham iti / ucyate: yathā hi kriyāsākṣiṇi kasmiṃścid avasthite kartā tadicchānuvidhāyī kāryaṃ

nirvartayati na svatantraḥ, evaṃ pradhānam api / pravṛttinivṛttyor yathā puruṣasyārthaḥ sidhyati tathā

mahadahaṃkāratanmātrendriyabhūtadevamanuṣyatiryaksthāvarabhāvena vyūhate na yadṛcchātaḥ /

(Yuktidīpikā on Sāṃkhyakārikā 19, p. 176, ll. 23-27).

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This brings us back to the dual purpose of puruṣa as the motivation for the creation initiated

by pradhāna, and to the second sense of anugraha, “favor.” I use this distinction in translation,

between “assistance” and “favor,” to draw attention to the fact that while pradhāna can play

an instrumental role, or provide “assistance,” in combining the manifest tattvas to initiate

physical creation, the eternally liberated puruṣa itself can never be in need of “assistance,” but

rather pradhāna “favors” puruṣa with the whole process of its activity and cessation of activity.

The term anugraha is used in this sense in Vyāsa’s Bhāṣya and Vācaspati’s

Tattvavaiśāradī on Yogasūtra 1.25, where it refers to the soteriological reason behind the

manifestation of Kapila, whose purpose is to initiate the Sāṃkhya tradition out of compassion

for embodied beings:

Even in the absence of his own [need for] favor (anugraha), the favor

(anugraha) of beings is his motive: “I will lift up the transmigrating puruṣas

through the teaching of knowledge (jñāna) and merit (dharma) in the ages,

dissolutions, and great dissolutions.” And thus it has been said: “The first knower, the glorious supreme ṛṣi, taking control of a transformation-mind

(nirmāṇacitta)16, out of compassion taught the philosophical system (tantra) to

Āsuri, who desired to know.”17

It is taught that Kapila attained knowledge (jñāna) as he was being born, due

simply to the favor (anugraha) of the great Lord (maheśvara). By the name

Kapila he is known as a particular incarnation (avatāra) of Viṣṇu.18

Both here and in the Yuktidīpikā, the term anugraha is used in explanation of the reason for

Kapila’s incarnation. Vyāsabhāṣya and Tattvavaiśāradī differ from the Yuktidīpikā, however,

in that they ascribe anugraha to īśvara (according to Vyāsa) and to Viṣṇu as īśvara (according

to Vācaspati), rather than to pradhāna.19

16 Chakravarti (1975, p. 85) points out the similarity of the concept of nirmāṇacitta to the Buddhist concept of

nirmāṇakāya (“transformation-body”). 17 tasyātmānugrahābhāve ’pi bhūtānugrahaḥ prayojanam / jñānadharmopadeśena kalpapralaya-mahāpralayeṣu saṃsāriṇaḥ puruṣān uddhariṣyāmīti tathā coktam / ādividvān nirmāṇacittam adhiṣṭhāya kāruṇyād bhagavān

paramarṣir āsuraye jijñāsamānāya tantraṃ provāceti // (Vyāsabhāṣya on Yogasūtra 1.25, p. 46). Vācaspati

attributes the quoted passage to the early Sāṃkhya teacher Pañcaśikha (Tattvavaiśāradī on Vyāsabhāṣya 1.25, p.

78, l. 18). 18 kapilasyāpi jāyamānasya maheśvarānugrahād eva jñānaprāptiḥ śrūyata iti / kapila nāma viṣṇor avatāraviśeṣaḥ prasiddhaḥ / (Tattvavaiśāradī on Vyāsabhāṣya 1.25, p. 78, ll. 22-23). 19 On the possibility that the author of the Yuktidīpikā also saw Kapila as an incarnation of “God” (īśvara), see

Bronkhorst (1983) and the discussion below.

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This soteriological connotation of anugraha seems also to be present where the term

occurs elsewhere in the Yuktidīpikā. It is notably used in connection with the production of

Sāṃkhya knowledge, which serves as the bridge between the two purposes of prakṛti’s

activity—embodied experience and the cessation of experience. In a discussion of the use of

formal inference in the exposition of Sāṃkhya philosophical texts (śāstra), the Yuktidīpikā

explains:

And the favor (anugraha) of everyone is to be accomplished. For this purpose,

the explanation of śāstra is undertaken by the wise, not for their own sake or for the sake of those with a similar intellect to their own.20

In this context, the term is used with a certain soteriological association, implying that the

tradition of Sāṃkhya śāstra exists for the sake of the eventual liberation of all puruṣas,

although this is not explicitly connected to the activity of pradhāna. Elswhere, though, we find

the participle anugṛhīta used in connection with pradhāna’s instillation of a desire for

knowledge in Kapila’s disciple, Āsuri:

But the prākṛta [bhāvas]21 are those like the dispassion of the glorious Āsuri.

For his merit, produced due to his esteem for the supreme ṛṣi, destroyed his impurity, because of being opposed [to it]. When this was destroyed, a stream

of purity came forth from prakṛti, favored (anugṛhīta) by which, having become

a mendicant, the desire to know arose in him, on account of affliction from the three forms of suffering.22

It seems rather significant that here, as in the Yuktidīpikā passage relating the production of the

bodies of Kapila and Brahmā, and in the Purāṇa passage relating the production of the egg of

Brahmā, prakṛti in its unmanifest form appears to exert a direct influence on its manifest

creation, here in the form of this “stream of purity” (śuddhisrotas).

20 sarvasya cānugrahaḥ kartavya ity evamarthaṃ śāstravyākhyānaṃ vipaścidbhiḥ pratāyate na svārthaṃ

svasadṛśabuddhyarthaṃ vā / (Yuktidīpikā on Sāṃkhyakārikā 6, p. 93, ll. 14-16). 21 The term prākṛta (“deriving from prakṛti”) refers to one of the three modes of production of the bhāvas

(conditions of the intellect). 22 prākṛtās tu tadyathā vairāgyaṃ bhagavadāsureḥ / tasya hi paramarṣisambhāvanād utpanno dharmo ’śuddhiṃ

pratidvandvibhāvād apaja<ghāna> / tasyām apahatāyāṃ prakṛteḥ śuddhisrotaḥ pravṛttaṃ yenānugṛhīto

duḥkhatrayābhighātād utpannajijñāsaḥ pravrajitaḥ / (Yuktidīpikā on Sāṃkhyakārikā 43, p. 234, ll. 9-13).

11

According to the Yuktidīpikā, pradhāna has a tendency to directly manifest itself in the

phenomenal world in the form of “streams.”23 Elsewhere in the text, the commentator relates

a mythological story (apparently quoted from an earlier text) in which the Sāṃkhya categories

of the intellectual creation (pratyayasarga)—namely error, incapacity, contentment, and

attainment—are manifested in streams out of pradhāna through the meditation of Brahmā.24

It could be that these categories represent another level of the manifestation of pradhāna’s

anugraha. Specifically, error, incapacity and contentment serve to keep puruṣa bound to the

experience of prakṛti’s activity, while attainment (siddhi) leads to the cessation of that

experience.

It may be significant that some of the Purāṇas associate these categories of the

pratyayasarga with another creation called the anugrahasarga, which is itself a part of a series

of streams produced through the meditation of Brahmā. This anugrahasarga is mentioned in

several of the major Purāṇas:

The fifth [creation] is the anugraha creation. This is arranged into four parts:

error, [in]capacity, contentment, and attainment.25

Oberhammer (1961, p. 153) notes that the only other place this anugrahasarga is found is in

the Sāṃkhya text Tattvasamāsasūtra, which he assumes represents an older strand of Sāṃkhya

tradition. He suggests that the anugrahasarga was a doctrine of pre-classical Sāṃkhya and

was then replaced with the paradigm of the bhāvas in the Sāṃkhyakārikā. On the basis of the

presentation of the bhāvas in the Sāṃkhyakārikā, Oberhammer argues that this anugrahasarga

would have been characterized by a reciprocal dependence of the subtle body and the categories

of the pratyayasarga (pp. 154-156). According to this view, the term anugraha takes on the

connotation of “mutual assistance” or “interdependence.”

23 This seems a suitable activity for pradhāna, which has a literal meaning something like “putting forth.” 24 See Yuktidīpikā on Sāṃkhyakārikā 46ab, p.239, ll. 11-20. 25 Vāyupurāṇa 6.53ab: pañcamo ’nugrahaḥ sargaś caturdhā sa vyavasthitaḥ / viparyyayeṇa śaktyā ca tuṣṭyā

siddhyā tathaiva ca /. Mārkaṇḍeya 47.28 reads: pañcamo 'nugrahaḥ sargaḥ sa caturdhā vyavasthitaḥ /

viparyayeṇa siddhyā ca śāntyā tuṣṭyā tathaiva ca //. The anugraha sarga is also mentioned in: Viṣṇu 1.5.24 and

Agni 20.5.

12

Alternatively, the term anugrahasarga might simply be another name for the

pratyayasarga. An explanation of the significance of the name can be suggested on the basis

of the usage of anugraha in the other contexts we have examined. The series of creations in

which the anugrahasarga appears in the Purāṇas, as well as the creation of the categories of

the pratyayasarga related in the Yuktidīpikā, arise as streams out of pradhāna through the

meditation of Brahmā. As discussed above, both in the Purāṇas and in the Yuktidīpikā, the

production of Brahmā himself was effected through the anugraha of pradhāna. The term

anugrahasarga, as an alternative name for the pratyayasarga, might therefore reflect the fact

that these categories represent a further manifestation of pradhāna’s anugraha or “favor.” The

initial manifestation of Brahmā (and of Kapila, according to the Yuktidīpikā), at the beginning

of creation, would be only the first instance of the anugraha shown to all puruṣas by pradhāna.

The manifestation of the pratyayasarga or anugrahasarga could be seen as a continuation of

this favor, as shown toward living beings after they have been embodied.

In all of the occurrences of anugraha we have considered, the term seems to imply that

unmanifest prakṛti exercises a kind of direct influence on the configurations of the manifest

tattvas. That is, pradhāna acts for the benefit of puruṣa not just by manifesting the tattvas in

the first place, but also by manipulating their phenomenal configurations, first by producing

the bodies of Brahmā and Kapila, and then later by producing the categories of the

pratyayasarga as “streams” that flow into the realm of phenomenal experience. The term

anugraha also appears to hold a soteriological connotation, especially when used in connection

with the birth of Kapila or with the tradition of Sāṃkhya śāstra initiated by him. It thus seems

logical to assume that, according to the author of the Yuktidīpikā, Kapila was born “out of the

anugraha of pradhāna” in order to lead embodied beings to liberation through knowledge.

In connection with this conclusion, an interesting (though indirectly related) usage of

the term anugraha can be found in the Mahābhārata. Here, the term is often used in the context

13

of the duties proper to a king.26 For example, in Book 3 of the epic, Hanumān, in conversation

with Bhīma, refers to nigraha, “repression” or “punishment,” and anugraha, “favor,” shown

toward one’s subjects, as two complementary duties of a king:

When a king correctly proceeds with repression and favor, then the limits of the people

are well established.27

An analogy can be drawn between these two duties of a king and the two purposes of prakṛti.

Just as a king both represses and favors his people, prakṛti both binds the puruṣas by the illusion

of identification with the phenomenal world, and liberates them by producing the knowledge

of their actual difference from prakṛti. According to the evidence of the Yuktidīpikā, Brahmā

fulfills the first of these purposes and Kapila the second.

Note that in the Yuktidīpikā’s explanation of the onset of Āsuri’s receptivity to the

“stream of purity” flowing from prakṛti, Kapila played a central role. It was due to his esteem

for Kapila as his teacher that Āsuri became receptive to the soteriological potential of prakṛti.

The anugraha of all puruṣas depends not only upon the preservation of Sāṃkhya śāstra, but

also upon its explanation by a qualified and respected teacher. The teacher-student

relationship, of which the relationship between Kapila and Āsuri provides the prototype, can

be seen as the key to the continued manifestation of prakṛti’s favor.

The author of the Yuktidīpikā treats Kapila’s original formulation of Sāṃkhya doctrine

as the foundation for this process of transmission. The commentator emphasizes the

conformity of the Sāṃkhyakārikā to Kapila’s original philosophical treatise:

[This] short text, not short in meaning, is possessed of all the characteristics of a tantra, just like an image in a mirror of the tantra of the supreme ṛṣi.28

26 I thank Prof. J. Fitzgerald (personal communication, March 13, 2010) for drawing my attention to this usage

of the term. 27 nigrahānugrahaiḥ samyag yadā rājā pravartate /

tadā bhavati lokasya maryādā suvyavasthitā // (Mahābhārata 3.149.39) 28 alpagrantham analpārthaṃ sarvais tantraguṇair yutam /

pāramarṣasya tantrasya bimbam ādarśagaṃ yathā // (Yuktidīpikā Intro., p. 3, ll. 2-3)

14

The importance placed upon Kapila’s original teaching by the commentator can be assumed to

reflect a conception of Kapila as a direct manifestation of prakṛti’s soteriological power, as the

initiator of a tradition of knowledge by which this power is made manifest. To return to the

cinema image, Kapila would be a hero whose mission is to convince everyone else that they

are only characters in a film.

If our conclusions so far are valid, there remains an interpretative problem with regard

to the position of the puruṣa with which Kapila is associated. Is there a liberated puruṣa still

in the audience, watching the film projected by prakṛti for the benefit of other puruṣas? Or,

perhaps, is Kapila without his own particular puruṣa but rather projected onto the screen for

the benefit of all puruṣas?

Bronkhorst (1983) suggests that the author of the Yuktidīpikā might see Kapila as an

incarnation of the Lord (īśvara), a view mentioned in the passages from Vyāsabhāṣya and

Tattvavaiśāradī discussed above. Bronkhorst’s discussion centers on the observation that the

Yuktidīpikā, like the Pātañjalayoga texts, accepts the existence of īśvara but views him as a

particular puruṣa and therefore passive (p. 153). Nevertheless, Bronkhorst observes, the

Yuktidīpikā does admit that īśvara incarnates in particular bodily forms (p. 152). Bronkhorst

argues that the evidence of the text also implies that Kapila might be one of the forms taken on

by īśvara (pp. 152-155). The evidence for this view is not conclusive, but an association of

Kapila with īśvara would be compatible with the soteriological conception of Kapila that is

arguably apparent in the text.

On the other hand, given the veneration with which Kapila is treated in the Yuktidīpikā,

if he were considered an embodiment of īśvara, one would expect the commentator to make

this explicit. Moreover, as we have seen, Kapila’s manifestation is explicitly associated only

with the soteriological purpose of prakṛti, which is directed toward all beings except for Kapila.

It thus seems plausible that Kapila, the bearer of a primordial Sāṃkhya śāstra, is considered a

direct manifestation of prakṛti in its universal aspect, before the activity of prakṛti becomes

15

differentiated according to the intellectual conditions (bhāvas) associated with particular

puruṣas. Kapila is produced as an embodiment of the creative potential behind the world as a

whole, for the purpose of drawing attention to the structure of that world. In other words, in a

postmodern twist, the director makes an appearance in his own film in order to remind the

audience that they are in fact watching a film.

References

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Gauḍapādabhāṣya (1933). The Sāṁkhya-Kārikā: Īśvara Kṛṣṇa’s Memorable Verses on

Sāṁkhya Philosophy with the Commentary of Gauḍapādācārya. Ed. Har Dutt Sharma. Poona: the Oriental Book Agency.

Mahābhārata (1999). Critical Edition. The Electronic Text of the Mahābhārata. Ed. John P.

Smith. http://bombay.oriental.cam.ac.uk/john/mahabharata/statement.html. Last

accessed: March 10, 2013.

Mārkaṇḍeyapurāṇa. GRETIL e-library edition. http://gretil.sub.uni-goettingen.de/gretil/

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vijñānabhikṣukṛta-yogavārtikavibhūṣita-vyāsabhāṣyasametam. Kāśīhindūviśvavidyālayasya kalā-saṃkāye saṃskṛtavibhāge ’dhyāpakena

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Secondary Literature

Bronkhorst, J. (1983). “God in Sāṃkhya.” In: Wiener Zeitschrift fur die Kunde Sudasiens 27: 149-164.

Chakravarti, P. (1975). Origin and Development of the Sāṃkhya System of Thought. Delhi:

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Munshiram Manoharlal.

Larson, G.J. and Bhattacharya, R.S. (1987). Encyclopedia of Indian Philosophies, Vol. 4:

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Oberhammer, G.R.F. (1961). “On the ‘Śāstra’ Quotations of the Yuktidīpikā.” In: Adyar Library Bulletin 25: 131-172.