Sankhya - A major school of Indian philosophy founded by the sage (more like saint) Kapila; it gives Ayurveda the theory of cause and effect (karma) and a systematic account of cosmic evolution according to 25 categories (25 Objects in the Descent of Consciousness): Purusha (The Unmanifest, Dharma Kaya, Dharma Dhatu, Tathagata Kaya), Cosmic Spirit; Prakruti (The Manifest, Sambhoga Kaya), Creative energy; Mahad, Cosmic Intelligence; Ahamkara, individuating principle or “I-maker”; Manas, mind; Indriya, the 10 sense (jnana indrya or buddhindrya) and motor facilities (motor organs or karmendriya); Tanmatras, the five subtle elements; and Maha Bhutas, the five gross elements. The word Sankhya is related to Sat, meaning Truth, and Khya, meaning knowledge.
Fair Use Source: Vaidya Vasant Lad, BAMS, MAsc, Textbook of Ayurveda Volume 1, 2001: p. 309
- Snippet from Wikipedia: Samkhya
Samkhya or Sankhya (; Sanskrit: सांख्य, romanized: sāṃkhya) is a dualistic orthodox school of Hindu philosophy. It views reality as composed of two independent principles, Puruṣa ('consciousness' or spirit) and Prakṛti (nature or matter, including the human mind and emotions).
Puruṣa is the witness-consciousness. It is absolute, independent, free, beyond perception, above any experience by mind or senses, and impossible to describe in words.
Unmanifest Prakriti is matter or nature. It is inactive, unconscious, and is a balance of the three guṇas (qualities or innate tendencies), namely sattva, rajas, and tamas. When Prakṛti comes into contact with Purusha this balance is disturbed, and Prakriti becomes manifest, evolving twenty-three tattvas, namely intellect (buddhi, mahat), ego (ahamkara), mind (manas); the five sensory capacities known as ears, skin, eyes, tongue and nose; the five action capacities known as hasta, pada, bak, anus, and upastha; and the five "subtle elements" or "modes of sensory content" (tanmatras), from which the five "gross elements" or "forms of perceptual objects" (earth, water, fire, air and space) emerge, in turn giving rise to the manifestation of sensory experience and cognition.
Jiva ('a living being') is the state in which Puruṣa is bonded to Prakriti. Human experience is an interplay of the two, Puruṣa being conscious of the various combinations of cognitive activities. The end of the bondage of Puruṣa to Prakriti is called Moksha (Liberation) or Kaivalya (Isolation).
Samkhya's epistemology accepts three of six pramanas ('proofs') as the only reliable means of gaining knowledge, as does yoga. These are pratyakṣa ('perception'), anumāṇa ('inference') and śabda (āptavacana, meaning, 'word/testimony of reliable sources'). Sometimes described as one of the rationalist schools of Indian philosophy, it relies exclusively on reason.
While Samkhya-like speculations can be found in the Rig Veda and some of the older Upanishads, some western scholars have proposed that Samkhya may have non-Vedic origins, developing in ascetic milieus. Proto-Samkhya ideas developed c. 8th/7th BC and onwards, as evidenced in the middle Upanishads, the Buddhacharita, the Bhagavad Gita, and the Mokshadharma-section of the Mahabharata. It was related to the early ascetic traditions and meditation, spiritual practices, and religious cosmology, and methods of reasoning that result in liberating knowledge (vidya, jnana, viveka) that end the cycle of duḥkha (suffering) and rebirth allowing for "a great variety of philosophical formulations". Pre-Karika systematic Samkhya existed around the beginning of the first millennium CE. The defining method of Samkhya was established with the Samkhyakarika (4th c. CE).
Samkhya might have been theistic or nontheistic, but with its classical systematization in the early first millennium CE, the existence of a deity became irrelevant. Samkhya is strongly related to the Yoga school of Hinduism, for which it forms the theoretical foundation, and it has influenced other schools of Indian philosophy.
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Adapted from Fair Use Source: Michael Dick, Ayurvedic Practitioner Handouts, 2001
Adapted from Fair Use Source: Vaidya Vasant Lad, BAMS, MAsc - Anisha Durve, L.Ac, DOM - Ayurvedic Institute Seminars 1995 through 2002