________________
XVI]
Philosophy of the Ahirbudhnya-samhitā
37
and no reason can be assigned as to why it suddenly changes itself from a potential to an actual state1. It is one and exists in identity with the Brahman, or the ultimate reality. It is this power which creates as its own transformation all categories pure and impure and all material forms as emanations from out of itself. It manifests itself as the kriyā, the vīrya, tejas and the bala of God, mere forms of its own expression and in all forms of duality as subject and object, as matter and consciousness, pure and impure, the enjoyer and the enjoyed, the experiencer and the experienced, and so on. When it moves in the progressive order, there is the evolutionary creation; and, when it moves in the inverse order, there is involution.
From a pair of two different functions of this power the different forms of pure creation come into being. Thus from knowledge (jñāna) and the capacity for unceasing work of never-ending creation (bala) we have the spiritual form of Samkarṣaṇa. From the function of spontaneous agency (aiśvarya) and the unaffectedness in spite of change (vīrya) is generated the spiritual form of Pradyumna; and from the power that transforms itself into the worldforms (śakti) and the non-dependence on accessories (tejas) is produced the form as Aniruddha. These three spiritual forms are called vyuha (conglomeration) because each of them is the resultant of the conglomeration of a pair of gunas. Though the two gunas predominate in each vyuha, yet each vyuha possesses the six qualities (sad-guna) of the Lord; for these are all but manifestations of Viṣṇu2. Each of these forms existed for 1600 years before the next form emanated from it, and at the time of the involution also it took 1600 years for each lower form to pass into the higher form. Schrader, alluding to the Maha-Sanatkumāra-Samhita, says: "Vasudeva creates from His mind the white goddess Santi and together with her Samkarṣaṇa or Siva; then from the left side of the latter is born the red goddess Śrī, whose son is Pradyumna or Brahman; the latter, again, creates the yellow Sarasvati and to
1
2
tasya staimitya-rupa ya saktiḥ śünyatva-rupini svātantryād eva kasmac cit kvacit sonmeṣam rcchati ātma-bhūtā hi ya śaktiḥ parasya brahmano hareḥ.
Ahirbudhnya-samhita, v. 3 and 4.
vyāpti-matram guno' nmeşo murtti-kāra iti tridhā catur-atmya-sthitir vişnor guna-vyatikaro-dbhava. Ibid. v. 21.
