Samkhya and Yoga go hand-in-hand.
The Samkhya model explains the universe and our place in it.
Yoga supports us to experience the realities Samkhya postulates.
The name ‘Samkhya’ is derived from the following words: number, enumeration, reckoning, summing-up, calculation, deliberation, reflection, reason, intellect.
It can be seen as meaning something along the lines of ‘a collection of numbered lists’.
This reflects the fact that the Samkhya breaks down the principles of cosmic evolution into categories using reasoned, scientific logic.
Brief overview:
One of the six orthodox Vedic philosophies, or darshana, of ancient India, Samkhya teaches discriminative knowledge which allows us to understand what we are, by deducing what we are not.
It is important to the study of Yoga because Yoga is the practical application of Samkhya.
The two darshana are often referred to together as the Samkhya-Yoga school.
Where Samkhya views the universe as a whole, a macrocosm, Yoga uses the same principles to relate to the individual, a microcosm.
Samkhya demonstrates that suffering, dukha, is caused by ignorance of our true nature, avidya.
Yoga offers a practical means to the realisation of that true nature.
Samkhya explains the universe through reason.
Yoga is the practical means (primarily meditative) which leads to the ability to discriminate between that which we are and that which we are not.
The goals of both Samkhya and Yoga are the elimination of suffering and the liberation of the soul.
The Bahagavad Gita acknowledges the two:
“In this world there are two roads of perfection … Jnana Yoga, the path of wisdom of the Samkhya, and Karma Yoga, the path of action of the Yogis”
Bhagavad Gita 03:03
trans: Juan Mascaro.
Purusha and Prakriti
Samkhya states that there are two fundamental realities:
- Purusha
- Prakriti
We might use words like: ‘Cosmic Consciousness’ or ‘Soul’ (Purusha), and ‘primordial soup’ or ‘quantum energy field’(Prakriti).
These account for everything that was, is and ever will be.
Their interaction is the source of all things.
All evolution and manifestation, every thing, is a result of the relationship between these two principles.
All experience and existence is derived from the eternal interplay of this duality.
Purusha (Sanskrit derivation: ‘man’ or ‘person’) is the first of the principles/tatvas in the Samkhya system.
It is:
- Consciousness, Being, Knowing, Awareness.
- The Soul of the universe.
- The animating principle in all beings, the Soul or Spirit.
- Infinite, unbounded, immanent, omnipresent, indestructible.
- The intrinsic subject in all things and in which all things are inseparably submerged.
Purusha is pure, content-less, shapeless, passive and unchanging.
It is Source, our true identity.
Purusha is that which we truly are.
Prakriti (Sanskrit derivation ‘making before/first’) is everything other than Purusha.
It is
- Matter, energy, the quantum field.
- The primary substance from which all things derive.
- Inanimate, unintelligent and unconscious, prakriti is the root source of all manifestation, the passive power of creation.
- The principle from which all attributes and all action come.\
- Infinite, eternal, limitless, shapeless, everywhere without boundary.\
It existed before anything was produced.
It was not caused but causes.
Prakriti consists of three powers/forces, the gunas, the interplay between which accounts for all diverse manifestation.
Understanding the guna model is also very useful in our Yoga practice.
Relationship
The relationship of Purusha and prakriti manifests all.
How does that relationship work?
Prakriti is the blind man carrying the lame man, Purusha.
The blind man can act but cannot perceive, the lame man can sense but not act.
The joining of the two is to their mutual benefit.
Purusha is given action/movement.
Prakriti is given perception/vision.
“Our Soul is Purusha, everything else is prakriti.
Purusha is absent in a corpse, all that is left is prakriti”.
TKV Desikachar.
Evolution
The samkhya evolution then breaks down the constituent parts of the universe so that through clear logic we can understand what we truly are.
It concerns itself with the cosmic evolution of the universe, stating that all things have order and that nothing is random.
It divides evolution into categories which we can know and understand.
These categories are classified under four main groups;
- That which was not caused and does not cause: Purusha
- That which was not caused but causes: prakriti
- Those which are caused and cause
- Those which are caused and do not cause
The third grouping lists principles known as ’evolvents’ (caused and cause).
These are:
- Cosmic intelligence/mahat
- Individuation/ego/ahamkara, and
- Five subtle elements/tanmatras: Sound, touch, form , flavour, odour.
The fourth grouping consists of principles known as ’evolutes’ (caused and do not cause). These are:
- Cosmic mind/manas,
- Five abstract knowing senses/jnanendriyas: hearing, feeling, sight, taste, smell.
- Five abstract working senses/karmendriyas: expression, procreation, excretion, grasping, and movement.
Conclusion
Samkhya takes a little getting your head around.
Placing Consciousness as central/first, it turns our standard materialist worldview inside out.
But, if you wish to take your understanding of Yoga (and of life!) to a deeper level, it is worth it.
A comprehension of the principles gives us a solid, philosophical foundation to build our Yoga practice on, and help us to live full, happy and healthy lives.
Yoga practice can then give us tools and techniques to support and guide us to experience the reality samkhya posits.
The Yoga Sutras state that the only reason that the seen world, prakriti, exists is that the true self, purusha, can come to know itself.
Yoga Sutras 02:21
tat-artha eva-dṛśyasya-ātmā
“It is only for the sake of the Self that the world exists” trans: Alistair Shearer
Whilst an understanding of Samkhya is very useful, essential perhaps, and intellectual discussion of its details and nuances inspiring and interesting, Yoga practice gives us direct experience of the truths beyond words.
You can’t best that.