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1. If asked the question, “What is the most fundamental substance?”, what would be our answer and what is its nature? Science does not know what is the “substance” that makes up subatomic particles etc. Do we go to Pradhana as a transformation of Brahman?
2. What is the “substance” of Pradhana? And what is the “substance” of ether? Is there any correlation here with what science knows about the most basic “substance” of things?
3. We understand the subtle body to be formed of false ego, intelligence, and mind. Is that subtle body made up of any elemental substance, like ether and air, or is it purely conceptual?
4. If the subtle body is purely conceptual, it is then an extension of the potency of the Jiva? If it is both conceptual and elemental, is it a mix of the Jiva’s potency and Krishna’s external potency? And if it is purely elemental, then presumably it is only an extension of Krishna’s external potency?
If asked the question, “What is the most fundamental substance?”, what would be our answer and what is its nature? Science does not know what is the “substance” that makes up subatomic particles etc. Do we go to Pradhana as a transformation of Brahman?
There is no substance. There is only form. You can read this article: There is Only Form. The Sanskrit word is Padārtha. The term pada means “part” and the term artha means “meaning and purpose”. Puruṣārtha means the meaning and purpose of mankind. Śabdārtha means the meaning and purpose of a word. So, how can Padārtha mean substance? The answer is: This is the concoction of Western dictionaries. When we call a table Padārtha, the Western translation is “substance”.
Substance always comes with substance-form dualism since Greek times. For example, Greeks would say that wood is a substance and table is a form. But we can ask: What is wood? Someone might say: Some object that has hardness and roughness. Then, what is hardness? It is a form. What is roughness? It is a form. There are many kinds of forms. By their combination, an object is created. Padārtha means a meaningful and purposeful part. These parts include hardness and roughness. The whole table is also a Padārtha and its constituents are also Padārtha. It is only forms.
All these forms come from the original form Krishna who has numerous qualities. Even hardness and roughness are qualities of Krishna. But Krishna also has softness and smoothness, which a table does not. Krishna’s body can be hard and rough, and His body can be soft and smooth. He can exhibit everything. But a table only exhibits a small portion of Krishna’s qualities. Hence, that table is a part of Krishna. But Krishna is not a substance. He is only form. All this substance thinking is created by Western translations of Sanskrit words because this is how Greeks were thinking. Later on, many people started talking about Padārtha as a substance due to bad dictionaries.
What is the “substance” of Pradhana? And what is the “substance” of ether? Is there any correlation here with what science knows about the most basic “substance” of things?
Pradhāna means “boss”. In Indian villages, there is a village Pradhāna, who is the head of the village. He is like a local ruler. Pradhāna is the first materialistic idea of bossiness. Every soul entering the material world gets this idea first. After that, everything is done to prove one’s superiority. When this bossiness is destroyed, then the soul is liberated. Otherwise, there is happiness from respect and unhappiness from disrespect. So, Pradhāna is the root idea. From that idea, there are many ideas.
Ether is also not a substance. The property of ether is sound. And ether emerges out of the mind, and the property of the mind is ideas. So, the mind produces ideas. Then ideas have a location relative to other ideas. And this location is given a name, which is called śabda. In modern science, we denote locations in space by coordinate system values such as {X, Y, Z}. The points such as A, B, and C, are different from the coordinates because the same point can be given different coordinates. Now change these points to ideas in the mind, and then give these ideas names, and you get Ether.
The name is a native property of an idea, which means each idea has a unique and natural name. For example, Krishna is the natural name of the Supreme Person. But we can also call Him “Supreme Person” in English. That is just like calling a point A by coordinates {P, Q, R} instead of {X, Y, Z}. Coordinate transforms are allowed, but there is still an original name. That original name is the property of the concept, and not arbitrary. That is called Ether. But when we make up our own name, then it is not Ether. It is just a coordinate system. Coordinate systems are relative space and Ether is absolute space. Absolute space is real just as relative space can be real for each person.
We understand the subtle body to be formed of false ego, intelligence, and mind. Is that subtle body made up of any elemental substance, like ether and air, or is it purely conceptual?
The body and mind are made out of the same three qualities. Only the combinations of these qualities are different. Air is also a concept or form. Fire is also a concept or form. Otherwise, you will have a mind-body problem, and based on a physical idea of body you will have to reject the mind because ideas cannot interact with things. For the mind to control the body (and vice versa), the body has to be just like an idea. That is a body comprising qualities, not substances. Even if we say the body is Padārtha, it is not a substance. It is a meaningful and purposeful part of the whole.
If the subtle body is purely conceptual, it is then an extension of the potency of the Jiva? If it is both conceptual and elemental, is it a mix of the Jiva’s potency and Krishna’s external potency? And if it is purely elemental, then presumably it is only an extension of Krishna’s external potency?
Krishna says in BG 9.4: mat-sthāni sarva-bhūtāni which means that “all bhūta have a sthāna or location within Me”. Then in BG 15.7, He says: mamaivāṁśo jīva-loke jīva-bhūtaḥ sanātanaḥ manaḥ-ṣaṣṭhānīndriyāṇi prakṛti-sthāni karṣati. The term mamaivāṁśo means that all planets and all living entities are my parts. Krishna has already explained that they have a position or location within Him. Then He is further saying all these things have a prakṛti-sthāna or position-location in prakṛti.
So what is the basis for this elemental, conceptual, and mixture conjecture? Everything is part of Krishna. We have discussed that even a table’s qualities are a subset of Krishna’s qualities. That subset of qualities has a location in prakṛti which as a whole has a location in Krishna. Every quality has a form. Mixtures of qualities also have forms. So, everything is spiritual. As spiritual as Krishna.
Material is not outside. Material is in us. It begins with Pradhāna which means “I am the boss”. Under this desire, we don’t see the self-effulgent, alive, and exuberant nature. The reason is that we wanted a personal slave so that we can claim to be its master. So, our desire is fulfilled by prakṛti pretending to be inert, dull, inactive, so that we can dominate Her. This pretension is not reality. It is an illusion.
The reality is the self-effulgent, alive, and exuberant nature of spirit. But She pretends to be inert, dull, and inactive to us, because we wanted to be a master, so the illusion of a slave is created. All spirit doesn’t do this pretentious activity. Only some spirit does. That spirit is called apara. The term apara doesn’t mean bad because para means supreme. So there is supreme energy and there is non-supreme energy. Non-supreme is not bad. It is just lower than the Supreme. She is also a part of Krishna, but She accepts this job because even the soul is a part of Krishna, as both are spirit.
Just like some day the tongue may want to taste a pizza so the hand works to make a pizza for the tongue. Then on another day, when the hand is tired, then the tongue compromises and accepts dry chapati. Hand and tongue are both part of the same body. Like that matter and soul are both part of Krishna. But one part can be called superior than the other. The soul demands someday “I want to be the boss” and another part of Krishna says: “Okay, we will oblige you for the moment”. After some time, the obliging part becomes non-obliging and says: “Enough of your nonsense.” Then the soul has to compromise. The fact is that if the soul were actually superior to matter, then it would never have to compromise. It will always have matter in its control. But that is not possible.
So, the material energy is more powerful. But Her job is dealing with demanding souls. When the eternal job is that of a jailor, then it is inferior to the job where you can do better things. Therefore, it is said that She is apara. Otherwise, She is much more powerful than the soul. People conditioned by false ideas of matter-spirit dualism think that this inferiority means inertness or unconsciousness.
This is so helpful; thank you. I have read the article and have two follow-up questions then please:
- I have heard reference to the material world as a transformation of Brahman. If everything is idea/concept/form and no substance, how is that a transformation of Brahman? My original (mis)understanding was that Brahman was a spiritual “substance” that transforms into material “substance” to facilitate our proposed enjoyment.
- I did not know the primordial Pradhana is the same word as used in modern hierarchical descriptions! Your description of Pradhana then seems to be completely correlated to the ahankara as the first covering of the atman and the false conception of “bossiness”. Is that correct? Is Pradhana then like the universal ahankara? If so, what are the universal equivalents of mind and intelligence?
Thank you once again.
I have heard reference to the material world as a transformation of Brahman. If everything is idea/concept/form and no substance, how is that a transformation of Brahman? My original (mis)understanding was that Brahman was a spiritual “substance” that transforms into material “substance” to facilitate our proposed enjoyment.
Brahman means a person. The material world is also Brahman. But She is Durga. Krishna is also Brahman. Soul is also Brahman. That is because Brahman means person.
The impersonalists have made Brahman a substance. They talk about transformation of Brahman and it is called vivarta-vada. Impersonalism is basically Western philosophy. In the West, they talk about substance and form, but substance is material and form is spiritual. Impersonalists just inverted that idea. According to them, substance is spiritual and form is material. Then we get substance-form dualism just like Greek philosophy. But Greeks could not solve this dualism. Similarly, impersonalists cannot resolve their substance-form dualism. Similarly, there is mind-body dualism where body is substance and mind is form. But even they cannot explain how mind-body dualism works.
Impersonalism is not Vedic philosophy. It was always separate from the Vedic tradition, but it existed in India just like materialism and voidism. Then Shankaracharya gave an impersonalist commentary of Vedanta Sutra to “prove” that even Vedic system is impersonalism. But before that, impersonalists had their own books which did not have any overlap with Vedic texts, similar to how Buddhists have their own books not overlapping with Vedic texts. Hence impersonalists cannot produce a single commentary on any Vedic text before Shankaracharya. It just comes out of a vacuum into the Vedic system. But if we study Vedic texts, every text talks about histories millions of years old. Hence, impersonalists will also say that all this millions of years old history is an imagination. That is because they don’t have anything like that. So they will say Purana is false, Itihasa is false. Or they will put a recent date on it. That is because they have nothing before Shankaracharya. But impersonalism is very popular today. Popularity is about supply and demand. There is demand so there is supply.
The basic point is what you are hearing about Brahman being a substance is impersonalism. Brahman is a person. Para-Brahman is Supreme Person. But impersonalists will only talk about Brahman and never about Para-Brahman. Most people don’t understand what is going on. Brahman doesn’t become matter. Durga is a divine personality. She expands into the material world. That process of expansion is an involved topic. But the basic principle is that the material world is unmanifest in Her, and it is manifest from Her. She doesn’t BECOME matter. She MANIFESTS matter. The impersonalists say that Brahman BECOMES matter. That is vivarta-vada. It is all nonsense because they cannot explain how Brahman becomes matter. When they cannot explain, they just change the topic.
I did not know the primordial Pradhana is the same word as used in modern hierarchical descriptions! Your description of Pradhana then seems to be completely correlated to the ahankara as the first covering of the atman and the false conception of “bossiness”. Is that correct? Is Pradhana then like the universal ahankara? If so, what are the universal equivalents of mind and intelligence?
You have to read Sankhya Sutra to understand these things. It is not so simple to equate Pradhana to Ahamkara but yes the basic idea is that the soul is ensnared by egotism. Pradhana means I am the boss. Then there are many kinds of bosses. Someone wants to be boss in wealth, someone wants to be boss in knowledge, someone wants to be boss in power, and so on. All these are called Prakriti. Then to be a boss in one thing, a whole system of entitlements must exist. For example, to be a boss in knowledge, one has to have the right to knowledge, he must be entitled to enter a university, he must be entitled to enroll in the course of his choice, he should not be discriminated against, his teachers should teach him respectfully, his ideas should be published in papers, his peers should cite his papers because he came first, nobody should plagiarize his work, in case of any problem, his grievances should be heard, he should be allowed to make favorable alliances, and so on. Hundreds of entitlements have to be fulfilled before one can become a boss. All these are mahattattva. In the West, they are called “rights”. All imaginary. But they are required to become great. Then after one becomes great due to all these rights, then he claims that everything has happened because of his hardwork, ability, diligence, and so on, rather that due to luck or good fortune. This is Ahamkara.
Krishna says that everything is happening due to Prakriti but the fool deluded by Ahamkara thinks he is doing it. For example, you see the richest people in the world. Not one person will say that he got rich due to luck when the fact is that they were born in rich families, they had good connections, they got admission into good colleges, they could get investors for their ideas due to family influence, and things happend at the right time for them, while others have been deprived despite their hard work. All rich people will say that they are rich because of their hardwork, creativity, ingenuity, and so on. This is Ahamkara. They got everything for free. But after they got it, they claim they did it.
Similarly, the Western countries have been looting the rest of the world for centuries. After they looted so much wealth, they gave a good life to their citizens and created all these imaginary rights. Otherwise, they had nothing. But today, no one will say that they have rights because they denied the rights of other people. They will only say that they have rights because they worked hard, they are intelligent, they have great culture, etc. But you go back a few hundred years, and you will find that they were killing each other. Nobody had rights. Only the rich had power, and the poor had no rights. Starvation, disease, exploitation, filthy living, even absence of toilets and baths, were the norm. They got a very good life by looting others and denying their rights. But after getting everything by looting others, they say that we got everything by our hard work. That is called Ahamkara.
Ahamkara means “I am the doer”. Pradhana means “I am the boss”. Mahattattva means “I am entitled to everything good in life”. Prakriti means “I want to become this and that”. So ego is a very big topic. It begins with Pradhana, then Prakriti, then Mahattattva, and then Ahamkara. All this is loosely called ego. It is all false. Hence it is also called false ego.
Thank you! Given what you’ve said about persons manifesting existence (e.g. Durga manifests the material world), and that there is no substance but only ideas (information), can you please explain which personalities correspondingly manifest the progressive ideas of: Pradhana, Prakriti, Mahattatva, Ahankara?
And is there anywhere you have written about the role of the three forms of Vishnu (Maha Vishnu, Garbhodakasayi Vishnu, and Ksirodakasayi Vishnu) in this regard, and what is the significance and nature of the Karana ocean and the Garbhodaka ocean?
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