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XXIV] Kapila's philosophy in the Bhāgavata-purāņa 39 Kapilā while an infant, but was also called Paramarşi Kapila? It seems practically certain that there had been a number of pantheistic, theistic and atheistic varieties of Sāmkhya. Since the Ahirbudhnya-samhitā gives the names of the chapters of the Şaşțitantra, it is almost certain that the author had seen this work, and that his account of Sāmkhya is in the main in agreement with it. The table of subjects enumerated shows that the work contained a chapter on Brahman, purusa, sakti (power), niyati (destiny), and kāla (time), and it is these elements that occur in the Ahirbudhnya account of Sāmkhya. It therefore seems very probable that the Ahirbudhnya account of Sāmkhya is largely faithful to the Șastitantra. We know that the Sāmkhya philosophy of Kapila had begun to change its form in some of its most important features, and it is quite probable that it had changed considerably by the time it was traditionally carried to Iśvarakrsna. It might still have been regarded as containing the essential instructions of the Şaşti-tantra and yet be very different from it; there is no proof that Iśvarakrsna had a chance of reading this original Şaşti-tantra, and it is reasonable to suppose that he had access only to a later version of it or to a revised compendium supposed to be based on it; it may be that the Șasti-tantra, being an ancient work, was probably so loosely worded that it was possible to get different interpretations from it
- like the Brahma-sūtra of Bādarāyana--or even that there were two Şasti-tantras
1 yam āhuḥ Kāpilam sāmkhyam paramarşim prajāpatim. Ibid. XII. 218. 9.
This Pancasikha is also described as pañca-rätra-viśārada, well-versed in the pañca-rätra rites.
2 In the Mathara-urtti of Mātharācārya on the Samkhya-karikā of Isvarakşşņa it is said that Şaşti-tantra means a tantra or work dealing with sixty subjects and not a work containing sixty chapters (tantryante vyutpădyante padārtha iti tantram). These sixty subjects are: five viparyayas or errors, twentyeight defects (aśakti), nine false satisfactions (tuşti), and eight miraculous achievements (siddhi)-altogether fifty items (kārikā 47)--the other ten subjects being the existence of prakyti as proved by five reasons (called the category of astitva), its oneness (ekatva), its teleological relation to puruşas (arthavattva and pārārthya), the plurality of the purusas (bahutva), the maintenance of the body even after jivan-mukti (sthiti), association and dissociation of prakrti with puruşa (yoga and viyoga), difference of prakrti and puruşa (anyatva), and final cessation of prakȚti (nivștti). Māghara quotes a Kārikā enumerating the latter ten subjects: astitvam, ekatvam, arthavattvam, pārārthyam, anyatvam, arthanivyttih. yogo viyogo, bahavaḥ pumāmsaḥ, sthitiḥ, śarirasya višeşa-vrttiḥ. Māthara-vȚtti, 72.
This enumeration, however, seems to be entirely arbitrary, and apparently there is nothing to show that the Şaşți-tantra was so called because it treated of these sixty subjects.
