Systematic Philosophy Between The Empires

Author(s): Johannes Bronkhorst
Publisher: Johannes Bronkhorst

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Reading the Past: Texts and History
which is fire), moving forward (pranämitä; which is wind), going everywhere (sarvatogati; which is ether).17 In introducing these generic qualities the Yoga Bhasya deviates from other sources on Samkhya, 18 The fact that the Yoga Bhasya, in spite of this difference, preserves the idea of the tanmätra as an atom is no doubt significant.
Another passage in the Yoga Bhasya can be interpreted along the same lines:19 "The single modification as sound-tanmätra of the constituents of nature (guna), which here take the form of something to be grasped (grähya), is sound as object. A single modification of sound etc. when they are of the same kind as corporeality (mürti) is the earth-atom, which is constituted of tanmätras. A single modification of those [atoms] is such a thing as the earth, a cow, a tree, a mountain. Also in the case of the other elements, by taking up viscosity (sneha), heat (auşnya), moving forward (pranamitva) or giving space (avakāśadāna) as generic quality, a single modification is to be produced." The crucial word tanmäträvayavaḥ must, in view of the context which speaks of ever more composite entities, be understood as a bahuvrihi compound: "the parts of which are tanmatras."20
A passage from the Maitrayaniya Upanisad (3.2; perhaps one of the first in which the term tanmätra is used) easily lends itself to an interpretation in which it means atoms or something of the kind: "The explanation of (bhutätman) is this: the word bhuta designates the five tanmätras. The word bhuta also designates the five principal elements. The aggregate of these is called body."21
A peculiar passage in Vyomasiva's Vyomavati-the earliest known commentary on the Padarthadharmasangraha which is better known by the name Prasastapādabhäsya-confirms the idea that the tanmatras were at one point the ultimate constituents of the molecules of matter. This passage discusses and explains the Vaiseșika position according to which a body is made up either of earth, or of water, or of fire, or of wind, but not of any combination of these elements. The
17 See Bronkhorst 1994a: 319. YBh 3.47 (sāmānyaviseṣātmā fabdādir grähyaḥ visayaḥ) seems to suggest that the tanmatras have the same names as the qualities, also in the opinion of the author of the Yoga Bhasya.
18 The parallelism between the position of the Yoga Bhasya and that of the Abhidharmakosa Bhasya-here as elsewhere-is striking; see Abhidh-k-bh(P) p. 81. 21-22; p. 53 1.9-10. Note also that the Yuktidipikä under SK 38 enumerates (in slokas) a great number of characteristics of the five elements, which includes the ones given in the Yoga Bhasya, though sometimes different expressions are used (YD p. 225 1. 24 ff.).
19 YBh 4.14: grähyätmakānām [guṇānām] fabdatanmätrabhāvenaikaḥ parināmaḥ śabdo visaya iti i śabdādīnām mūrtisamānajättyänām ekaḥ pariņāmaḥ prthiviparamāņus tanmäträvayavaḥ | tesäm caikaḥ parinämaḥ prthivi gaur vyksaḥ parvata ity evamädil bhūtāntaresy api snehausnyapraṇämitvävakāśadānāny upādāya sāmānyam ekavikärämbhaḥ samadheyaḥ I.
20 Hattori (1968: 154 n. 5.31) concludes from this passage that "[t]he Samkhyas hold that the five kinds of tanmatras are composed of their respective atoms." This interpretation may have to be revised.
21 van Buitenen 1962: 102: asyopavyäkhyānam: pañca tanmātrāṇi bhūtafabdenocyante | atha pañcamahäbhätäni bhatasabdenocyante | atha teşam yad samudayas tac chariram ity uktam I; tr. van Buitenen 1962: 129.
Bronkhorst: Systematic Philosophy between the Empires
objection is raised that bodies might consist of various elements at the same time. In this connection the following passage occurs:22
But if you accept the following: The constitution of a part, too, [can take place] with various elements. For example, a dvynuka is constituted of an atom of earth and an atom of water, or again of an atom of water and an atom of fire, or of an atom of fire and an atom of wind. In the same way it [can be constituted] of wind and the tanmätra of sound. These dvyanukas, once arisen, constitute, passing through [the stages] tryanuka etc., a body.
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This passage presents a position that is not accepted by Vyomasiva, who points out that according to Vaiśeşika doctrine the resulting dvyanukas and more complex entities cannot possess the qualities inhering in the constituent atoms. All this does not concem us at this moment. What does concem us is that the sabdatanmatra -the tanmätra of sound, or the tanmatra which is sound is here presented as a constituent of a potential dvynuka, and therefore as some kind of atom, besides the atoms of earth, water, fire, and wind. It takes the place of what should be the atom of ether, but obviously, ether being one and omnipresent, there can be no atom of ether in Vaisesika.
This passage is enigmatic, because it is not quite clear who the opponent is. One may however guess that Vyomasiva took this discussion, and therefore the position of the opponent, from an earlier work. Indeed, the same portion of the Vyomavati ends with a long citation from a work which is identified as asya sutrasya bhāṣyam "the Bhasya on this sutra." The sutra concerned (bhūyastvad rasavattvac codakam rasajñāne prakṛtiḥ) cannot be identified with certainty, but appears to have belonged to the Vaiseşika Sutra.23 The Bhasya on the Vaišeşika Sutra was not, of course, the Prasastapādabhasya, but the Kalandi, probably composed after Vasubandhu but before Dignaga; this we have seen. It is therefore possible, or even likely, that the discussion about dvynukas constituted of wind and sabdatanmatra occurred already in this earlier text, which may, in its turn, have been acquainted with an earlier work of Samkhya, in which tanmatra was still known in the sense of "constituent of a molecule." It seems, however, clear that the position described by Vyomasiva and perhaps taken by him from the Katandi-represents some hybrid between Samkhya and Vaiseşika: whereas the notion of tanmatra appears to be Samkhya, that of dvyanuka and tryanuka is decidedly Vaiseșika.
22 Vy. I p. 81 1. 13-21: athavayavasyapy anekabhūtair arambhaḥ | tathahi, parthiväpyabhyam paramanubhyam dvyanukam, punar äpyataijasābhyām, tathā taijasavāyaviyābhyām ārabdham iti I evam vayusabdatanmäträbhyam | etäni dvyaṇukany utpannāni tryaṇukādiprakrameņa sariram arabhanta ity abhyupagame.
23 Vy. I p. 82 1. 20ff. Two slightly different sutras with their Bhasyas are cited Vy. I p. 85 1.17ff. (bhāyastväd räpavattvac ca rapajñāne praktiḥ käraṇam tejah) and I p. 90 1. 4ff. (bhūyastvät sparśavattvāc ca sparśajñāne prakṛtir väyuḥ).