Samkhya,an ancient Philosophy of India

Sāṃkhya is the name of a system of religious thought associated with a series of key concepts in the Hindu tradition, such as puruṣa , prakṛti , guṇa , sattva, rajas, tamas, buddhi, tattvas, pariṇāma, tanmātras, and kaivalya, and which traces its origin to the sage Kapila. Sāṃkhya terminology and ideas had a history of several hundred years, before the Sāṃkhya system of religious thought developed in the first centuries CE, and nonsystematic Sāṃkhya continued to develop in a number of textual traditions after the Sāṃkhya system was created. The Sanskrit word sāṃkhya relates to number and enumeration but its technical meaning also refers to “reasoning,” “reasoning method,” and “the method of salvific knowledge” (Edgerton, 1924). As the name of a philosophical system, the term sāṃkhya is understood to mean “relating to number, enumeration, or calculation” and to refer to the method of enumerating the contents of experience and the world (Larson, 2008, 3).
Sāṃkhya as a system of religious and philosophical thought, one of the darśanas, refers to the tradition associated with the lost Ṣaṣṭitantra and Īśvarakṛṣṇa’s Sāṃkhyakārikā and the tradition of commentaries on the Sāṃkhyakārikā, of which Vācaspatimiśra’s Tattvakaumudī (850–950 CE) and the Yuktidīpikā (800 CE?) often are considered the most important from a philosophical point of view. The other old commentaries Suvarṇasaptati (6th cent. CE), Sāṃkhyavṛtti (6th cent. CE), Saṃkhysaptativṛtti (6th cent. CE), Sāṃkhyakārikābhāṣya of Gauḍapāda (6th cent. CE), Jayamaṅgalā (8th cent. CE or later), and Māṭharavṛtti (9th cent. CE or later) are shorter but important sources for the tracing of historical developments and changes in interpretation (for summaries of the philosophical arguments of these texts, see Larson & Bhattacharya, 1987). The later foundation texts, the Tattvasamāsasūtra (14th or 15th cent.) and Sāṃkhyasūtra (15th or 16th cent.), and the commentaries on these texts, mark the second period of flourishing of the Sāṃkhya system, with Vijñānabhikṣu (1550–1600) as perhaps the most important thinker of that period. Here Sāṃkhya was to a larger degree put in line with the tradition of nonphilosophical Sāṃkhya of the Upaniṣads and Purāṇas.

Plurality of Sāṃkhya Traditions 

Although the school of Sāṃkhya philosophy represented by Īśvarakṛṣṇa’s Sāṃkhyakārikā (350–400) and the commentary tradition on this text often are identified as Sāṃkhya as such, there are also other traditions of Sāṃkhya. Several researchers have argued that before the Sāṃkhya system of religious thought developed, there were probably many Sāṃkhya centers where more or less parallel doctrines developed, and that in the analysis of this development, we should allow for the greatest diversity of doctrine (van Buitenen 1957, 101–102; Larson, 1979, 95). This statement is valid also for the period after the Sāṃkhyakārikā. There continued to be several different traditions of Sāṃkhya with more or less parallel doctrines, and nonphilosophical Sāṃkhya continued to be an important trend of thought in large parts of the Hindu mythological and theological traditions.
Although the word sāṃkhya in the early texts probably referred to the reasoning method for attaining salvific liberation, the emerging Sāṃkhya teaching was in addition primarily associated with certain concepts and a certain way of categorizing the experience by enumeration of principles in a hierarchical order. A plurality of views that apply Sāṃkhya terminology are mentioned in the early sources. In the descriptions of Sāṃkhya in the Mahābhārata , the most important early source, are found references to teachings of 17 principles (tattvas; MBh. 12.239; 12.267.28), 20 (MBh. 12.267.30), 24 (MBh. 12.306), 25 (MBh. 12.298), and 26 (MBh. 12.296.11). Later an even larger plurality of views is referred to, in the Bhāgavatapurāṇa (11.22.1–3). The 25 principles became the doctrine of classical Sāṃkhya. Sāṃkhya in the Mahābhārata is not always a system of philosophy but seems more to refer to a way of thinking about the world by the means of certain concepts and a particular method for the sake of salvific liberation. The highest principles are sometimes considered to be brahman , ātman , kṣetrajña, puruṣa, Īśvara, Nārāyaṇa, or Kṛṣṇa, and both monistic, theistic, and dualist interpretations are associated with the Sāṃkhya enumeration in the Mahābhārata.
The difference between Sāṃkhya as a philosophical system and Sāṃkhya as a way of thinking about the world by the means of certain concepts for the sake of salvific liberation, that is, the difference between philosophical and nonphilosophical Sāṃkhya is not only in terms of number of principles, but also the pattern of enumeration. In nonphilosophical Sāṃkhya the enumeration of the basic principles (tattvas) starts with the causes of the gross material world, the mahābhūtas, the earth element, pṛthivī, being the first tattva, and ends with the ultimate principles of prakṛti (the material principle) as the 24th principle and puruṣa (the consciousness principle) as the 25th and final principle. In nonphilosophical Sāṃkhya the purpose of the enumeration is the attainment of salvific liberation. As in philosophical Sāṃkhya, life in saṃsāra is duḥkha (suffering), and liberation from the cycle of rebirth is the ultimate goal. It is of significance that prakṛti and puruṣa are not the first principles in the enumeration, but the last. That the principles are listed in the order in which they are realized by the renunciant who seeks salvific knowledge, and not in the order in which they would have become manifest if mapping a cosmogony had been the intention, shows that the main purpose of the enumeration in Sāṃkhya was to instruct in the attainment of salvific knowledge and not to explain the origin of the world. Sāṃkhya is a teaching dealing with salvific liberation (mokṣa), and the purpose is a practical one, the realization of ultimate reality, that is, the realization of a principle that is beyond change and does not die when the body dies, namely, the puruṣa principle. Precursors to the Sāṃkhya style of mapping the principles of salvific knowledge in the order in which they are realized are found in the Kaṭhopaniṣad:
Higher than the senses are their objects;
Higher than sense objects is the mind;
Higher than the mind is the intellect;
Higher than the intellect is the immense self. (KaṭhU. 3.10)
 
Higher than the immense self is the unmanifest;
Higher than the unmanifest is the person;
Higher than the person there’s nothing at all.
That is the goal, that’s the highest state. (KaṭhU. 3.11; trans. Olivelle) 
In the Sāṃkhyakārikā, however, the enumeration starts with puruṣa and prakṛti and their association (saṃyoga), and the emergence from prakṛti of the 23 manifest principles. The presentation in Sāṃkhyakārikā is from puruṣa as the first and the terms 24th and 25th principle are not used. Perhaps developments in the other schools of philosophy influenced the way Sāṃkhya was presented in the Sāṃkhyakārikā. Cosmogony most probably was unrelated to Sāṃkhya (Brockington, 1999, 477), but the Sāṃkhya categories were used later in cosmogonies and cosmologies in the nondifferentiated Sāṃkhya traditions that existed before the origin of the Sāṃkhya system of philosophy, and which continued to exist mostly uninfluenced perhaps by the technical philosophy of the Sāṃkhya system, particularly in the Purāṇas with their interests in mythology and divinities.


The Yoga system is also part of the Sāṃkhya pluralism. The system of religious thought now called Pātañjala Yoga, which is associated with the Yogaśāstra (Yogasūtra and Vyāsabhāṣya) as its foundation text, originated as a school of Sāṃkhya and was only several centuries later considered a school separate from Sāṃkhya. The Sāṃkhya philosophy of the Yogaśāstra shows strong Buddhist influence. The author of the Yogaśāstra, Vindhyavāsin (350–400 CE), was a Sāṃkhya philosopher who systematized traditions of meditation and Sāṃkhya philosophy, probably responding to criticism by Abhidharma Buddhist philosophers and debates with them. The 14th-century text Sarvadarśanasaṃgraha of Mādhavācārya labels Pātañjala Yoga seśvarasāṃkhya (theistic Sāṃkhya) and presents it as a system that accepts 26 principles, and Parameśvara (“Supreme Lord”) as the 26th principle. Introducing Parameśvara as a 26th principle is, however, different from the Pātañjala Yoga of the Yogaśāstra and its tradition of commentaries, and it misrepresents Pātañjala Yoga. Īśvara in Pātañjala Yoga is a special puruṣa, not an additional principle, but Mādhavācārya might have wanted to promote another interpretation of Yoga. Haribhadra (c. 700–770 CE) in the Ṣaḍdarśanasaṃuccaya is more correct when he writes that some Sāṃkhyas are nontheists (sāṃkhyā nirīśvarāḥ kecit), and some Sāṃkhyas are theists (kecid īśvaradevatāḥ), but that they both accept the number 25 as the number of tattvas (ṢDsam. 35). In Haribhadra’s time, Yoga was probably easily identified as a school of Sāṃkhya.
Another indication of the plurality of Sāṃkhya viewpoints is that in the philosophical texts that criticize Sāṃkhya, ideas are encountered that are not found among any of the surviving Sāṃkhya schools or texts such as the belief that substances were a collection of qualities or that creation meant a division in pradhāna (i.e. prakṛti; Bronkhorst, 2006; 2007b). Such ideas might point to a plurality of Sāṃkhya traditions but may also mean that commentaries belonging to other schools sometimes misrepresented or misunderstood the Sāṃkhya teaching.
The term "Sāṃkhya" now most often refers to the Sāṃkhya tradition of Sāṃkhyakārikā and the tradition of philosophical commentaries on that text, but there continued to be several different traditions of Sāṃkhya also after the Sāṃkhyakārikā, Yogasūtra, and Vyāsabhāṣya. A tradition of Sāṃkhya promoted by a sage called Kapila (see below) that blends the traditions of Sāṃkhya and Yoga with the devotion to Kṛṣṇa and puranic theories of creation is found in the Kapilagītā (Kapilopadeśa) of the Bhāgavatapurāṇa. After the development of the distinct schools of Sāṃkhya philosophy, nonphilosophical Sāṃkhya continued to a large degree a life of its own little influenced by the attempts of systematic thinkers to create coherent systems out of the nonsystematized Sāṃkhya categories (Bronkhorst, 2006, 289). In the Purāṇas, Sāṃkhya categories are presented in a number of contexts that represent this nonphilosophical Sāṃkhya.
The impact of Sāṃkhya on Hinduism is much greater than just as one of the darśanas. Many of the Sāṃkhya concepts and the Sāṃkhya way of categorizing the world are found in large parts of the Hindu textual tradition: Kaṭhopaniṣad, Śvetaśvātaropaniṣad, Mahābhārata, Bhagavadgītā, Manusmṛti ( dharmaśāstra ), Carakasaṃhitā (āyurveda ), and large parts of many Purāṇas (such as Mārkaṇḍeyapurāṇa, Brahmāṇḍapurāṇa, Kūrmapurāṇa, Viṣṇupurāṇa, Bhāgavatapurāṇa, Garuḍapurāṇa, Matsyapurāṇa, Śivapurāṇa; Larson, 1979). The Sāṃkhya terminology and way of categorizing the world also became part of many theologies and philosophies. Śaṅkara’s Advaita Vedānta accepted most of the Sāṃkhya terminology and analysis, and its criticism is mainly of the independence of the prakṛti principle. The example of Advaita Vedānta illustrates that Sāṃkhya was often included in other systems in their theological framework. Vaiṣṇava, Śaiva, and Śākta theologies included the Sāṃkhya scheme of enumeration but developed further principles to add or explain the qualities of the divine principle that they worshipped. From the time of the composition of the later parts of the Mahābhārata, the Bhagavadgītā, Kaṭhopaniṣad, and Śvetaśvātaropaniṣad, and up to the present, the Sāṃkhya terminology has been omnipresent in traditions of theologies and sacred narratives of supreme divine beings. Sāṃkhya terminology is found in contexts that are theistic, monistic, polytheistic, and so on, from their earliest manifestations to contemporary Hinduism.

The Term Sāṃkhya

In the earliest texts in which the Sāṃkhya terminology as well as the word sāṃkhya appear, sāṃkhya is often treated next to or compared to traditions of yoga (with various meanings of this term). In the earliest Upaniṣads, the term sāṃkhya is not used at all. In the Śvetāśvataropaniṣad, a late theistic Upaniṣad with much Sāṃkhya terminology (Johnston, 1930) that was composed probably around the same time as the Bhagavadgītā, it is used once. Sāṃkhya here probably means “salvific knowledge”:
"The changeless, among the changing, the intelligent, among intelligent beings, the one, who dispenses desires among the many – when a man knows that cause, which is to be comprehended through the application of sāṃkhya (sāṃkhyayogādhigamyaṃ), as God, he is freed from all fetters" (ŚvetU. 6.13; trans. Olivelle).
The Śvetāśvataropaniṣad and the Kaṭhopaniṣad are the earliest Upaniṣads in which Sāṃkhya terminology is found and are also among the earliest textual products of the emerging theistic traditions. In the Mahābhārata, sāṃkhya is also often associated with belief in god or brahman. Later descriptions of Sāṃkhya speak about theistic and nontheistic Sāṃkhya. Notably, the compound sāṃkhyayoga – and not only the term sāṃkhya – is used in the above-quoted verse from Śvetāśvataropaniṣad. Both F. Edgerton and G.J. Larson interpret the word sāṃkhyayoga here as a dvandva compound, “sāṃkhya and yoga” (Edgerton, 1924, 15) and “proper reasoning and spiritual discipline” (Larson, 1987, 6). Since the word “yoga” is used in so many different meanings and is also a nontechnical term meaning “application” or “practice,” it is often difficult to identify the meaning of the word in the early texts, but yoga here perhaps just means “application.” The use of the word sāṃkhyayoga even with this intended meaning may nevertheless have influenced the later acceptance of the term “Sāṃkhya-Yoga.”
In the Mahābhārata, the terms sāṃkhya and yoga are frequently used together, and the subjects of sāṃkhya and yoga are treated next to each other (for a discussion of the terms sāṃkhya and yoga in the Mahābhārata, see Larson, 1979, 108–134; Schreiner, 1997). Yoga in these contexts often refers to traditions of asceticism and not the Yoga system of religious thought associated with Pātañjala Yoga. The various yoga passages in the Mahābhārata probably, argues G.J. Larson, “represent the context from which a particular technical tradition, namely the Sāṃkhya, is beginning to emerge”; he concludes, "[I]n all of these environments the terms sāṃkhya and yoga do not refer to philosophical positions in the sense of systematic reflection that seeks overall coherence and persuasive presentation" (Larson, 2008, 35).
G.J. Larson argues that sāṃkhya and yoga instead refer to “spiritual methodologies.” P. Schreiner has made the case that the yoga passages in the Mahābhārata appear to be older than the sāṃkhya passages and argues that sāṃkhya is the newcomer in the epic. These passages in the epic do not, however, refer to the technical Sāṃkhya and Yoga systems, and, therefore, that the yoga passages are considered older does not mean that Sāṃkhya was imposed on Yoga. G.J. Larson states that "[t]here simply is no primordial or pure Ur-Yoga upon which the Sāṃkhya philosophy was 'foisted' or to which it was 'falsely attributed.' Quite the contrary, instead of a single primordial Ur-Yoga, there appears to have been a great plurality of diffuse speculative and/or ascetic traditions and the absence of technical formulations prior to the last two centuries or so before the Common Era and the first centuries of the Common Era" (Larson, 2008, 36). Several statements in the Mahābhārata that claim that sāṃkhya and yoga are the same can, according to G.J. Larson, be interpreted as “attempts to deny a process of differentiation which is beginning to occur in later times” (Larson, 2008, 35).
In the Bhagavadgītā, the term sāṃkhya often means “the way of salvation by pure knowledge, the intellectual method ... implying quietism, renunciation of action,” and yoga means “disciplined, unselfish activity ... with indifference to results” (Edgerton, 1924, 4). Yoga in the Bhagavadgītā when it is contrasted to sāṃkhya is synonymous with karmayoga, and sāṃkhya synonymous with jñānayoga:
loke ’smin dvividhā niṣṭhā purā proktā mayā ’nagha
jñānayogena sāṃkhyānāṃ karmayogena yoginām
In this world a two-fold foundation was declared by me in ancient days, oh blameless one,
By the application of knowledge ( jñānayoga) of the followers of the way of salvific knowledge (sāṃkhya) and the application of action (karmayoga) of the followers of the way of salvific activity (yoga). (BhG. 3.3)
 
sāṃkhyayogau pṛthag bālāḥ pravadanti na paṇḍitāḥ
ekam apy āsthitaḥ samyag ubhayor vindate phalam
The fools and not the learned ones speak about the way of salvific knowledge (sāṃkhya) and the way salvific activity (yoga) as separate.
Resorting completely to just one of them, a person wins the result of both. (BhG. 5.4)
 
yat sāṃkhyaiḥ prāpyate sthānaṃ tad yogair api gamyate
ekaṃ sāṃkhyaṃ ca yogaṃ ca yaḥ paśyati sa paśyati
The place gained by the followers of salvific knowledge, that place is reached also by the followers of salvific activity.
He sees who sees that the sāṃkhya method and the yoga method are one. (BhG. 5.5) 
In the Bhagavadgītā (ch. 2) Kṛṣṇa first explains sāṃkhya and thereafter yoga, and sāṃkhya and yoga are here considered different methods. The follower of the sāṃkhya way is the jñānin (the knower), and the follower of the yoga way is the yogin, but these are here probably not followers of any particular systems of thought, but of different “ways of gaining salvation” (Edgerton, 1924, 6). F. Edgerton argued that the term sāṃkhya did not imply any system of thought at all, “but merely the opinion that man could gain salvation by knowing the supreme truth, however formulated” (Edgerton, 1924, 6) and that sāṃkhya refers to a belief in the possibility of attaining salvific liberation by means of knowledge. F. Edgerton argued that “the Sāṃkhyas are the people who tend to promise salvation to any one who knows any truth that for the moment is regarded as specially profound or important” (Edgerton, 1924, 18), but this might be an overstatement since the Bhagavadgītā seems to have been familiar with some version of Sāṃkhya (Malinar, 2007).

The Separateness of the Self

Even if the word sāṃkhya in many instances referred to the idea of attainment of salvation by means of knowledge of the truth, however formulated, a doctrine that is central both in many early statements about Sāṃkhya in the Mahābhārata and in classical Sāṃkhya is that the self is different from the body-and-mind complex, which humans usually identify as themselves, that ignorance of this difference is the cause of suffering, and that the realization of the fundamental difference of self and matter is the salvific knowledge. In classical Sāṃkhya, this became the basic doctrine of the dualism of the principle of consciousness (puruṣa) and the principle of matter (prakṛti). In the Śvetāśvataropaniṣad, the difference of the self is stated in two famous verses thought to be clear references to the dualism of puruṣa and prakṛti of Sāṃkhya (Larson, 1979, 84–85):
"One unborn male [billy goat], burning with passion, covers one unborn female [nanny goat] coloured red, white, and black, and giving birth to numerous offspring with the same colours as hers, while another unborn male leaves her after he has finished enjoying her pleasures"
"Two birds, who are companions and friends, nestle on the very same tree. One of them eats a tasty fig; the other, not eating looks on" (ŚveU. 4.5–6).
In the Mahābhārata, the dualism is stated in a number of similes whose purpose is to give an intuitive understanding of the truth of dualism, a flash of understanding and the realization of the salvific knowledge. The similes are usually presented after a theoretical exposition of the doctrines (Jacobsen, 2006). Similes seem to have been important in the teaching of the Sāṃkhya doctrine for the realization of the separateness of matter and consciousness. Similes are found in all the Sāṃkya texts from the Sāṃkhya teaching in the Mahābhārata to the Sāṃkhysūtra and might have been part of the method of realization of knowledge (Jacobsen, 2006). In the dialogue between Yajñavalkya and Janaka (MBh. 12.298–306), a number of similes are used to convince and to confer knowledge.
"Different from avyakta is puruṣạ ... As a blade of reed is different from the outer cover, so is puruṣa different from avyakta" (MBh. 12.303.14).
"Know the mosquito is different, the udumbara tree is different. The mosquito is not affected by its conjunctions with the udumbara tree" (MBh. 12.303.14).
"Similarly the fish is different, the water is different. The fish is not stained by the touch of water on all sides" (MBh. 12.303.15).
"Fire is different, the pot in which fire is kept is different. Know always this. The fire is not stained by the touch of the pot" (MBh. 12.303.16).
"The lotus is different, the water is different. No lotus is stained by the touch of water" (MBh. 12.303.17).
These similes function to reiterate the central point of Sāṃkhya, that even if puruṣa and avyakta (i.e. prakṛti) are experienced as joined together, they are nevertheless separate (Jacobsen, 2006, 590–591):
"With these are always found association and disassociation. But the ignorant person does not see it in that way" (MBh. 12.303.18).
The similes are used to create an immediate understanding of the doctrine of dualism. The fish lives in water, but is different from water; in the same way, the self is different from the body and mind with which it is associated. The bird in the tree is different from the tree. But when a person knows the truth and thinks “I am another” (anyo ’ham), “this is another” (anya eṣa), then he becomes liberated (tadā kevalībhūta) (MBh. 12.306.74). This view, identified as sāṃkhyadarśana in the Mahābhārata itself (MBh. 12.303.20), continues to be the fundamental doctrine of Sāṃkhya. In this context, it is even stated that those who see the wrong way – their darśana is not correct (na samyak teṣu darśanam) – enter the dreadful hell again and again (te vyaktaṃ nirayaṃ ghoraṃ praviśanti punaḥ punaḥ; MBh. 12.303.19). This salvific knowledge is stated in a similar way in Sāṃkhyakārikā 64 (in this case also subsequent to the presentation of the theory and the similes of the text):

na ’smi na me na ’ham
I am not (consciousness), (consciousness) does not belong to me, the I is not (conscious). (SāṃK. 64).
In classical Sāṃkhya, there are two ultimate principles, puruṣa and prakṛti, and puruṣa is separate and different from prakṛti. In Sāṃkhyakārikā similes are used to illuminate another central doctrine about the separateness of puruṣa and prakṛti, that consciousness is a passive witness, and that all activity, also the salvific knowledge, is part of matter, prakṛti, and that therefore it is the activity of matter (avyakta, pradhāna, or prakṛti), knowledge (jñāna) that saves consciousness (puruṣa). The doctrine of dualism, that the self is separate from the body-and-mind complex, led to a fundamental question. How could prakṛti, which is unconscious, function for the sake of another, the puruṣa, which is separate from it? Why does prakṛti function for the sake of liberation of puruṣa? A simile used to illustrate this relationship is that of the lame man and the blind man who help each other to reach the goal by the blind man carrying the lame man; in the same way, presumably, prakṛti functions to help puruṣa reach the goal. Milk being unconscious nevertheless functions as nourishment for the calf, and in the same way, the material principle (pradhāna) functions for the release of puruṣa (SāṃK. 57). As a man acts for the cessation of desire, in the same way, the material principle (avyakta) functions for the release of puruṣa (SāṃK. 58); and as a dancer ceases her dance when the performance has been completed, so the material principle (prakṛti) ceases its manifestation to puruṣa. The separateness of puruṣa from prakṛti and the realization of their separateness by means of knowledge have remained the central doctrines in Sāṃkhya.

Sāṃkhyakārikā  

The earliest figure whose teaching of Sāṃkhya is possible to reconstruct is Vārṣagaṇya (c. 100–200 CE), who is associated with the lost text Ṣaṣṭitantra (Sixty Topics) – the earliest text of philosophical Sāṃkhya (for a systematic presentation of the philosophy of Vārṣagaṇya, see Larson & Bhattacharya, 2008, 131–140). Better known are the teachings of Vindhyavāsin and Īśvarakṛṣṇa, who composed the foundation texts of the Yoga and Sāṃkhya systems of religious thought, respectively, the Yogaśāstra and the Sāṃkhyakārikā. Yogaśāstra (Yogasūtra and Vyāsabhāṣya) became the foundation text of the Yoga system and represents the Sāṃkhya philosophy of Vindhyavāsin. Sāṃkhyakārikā of Īśvarakṛṣṇa is the oldest surviving text of the tradition of Vārṣagaṇya. These texts marked the end of a process, and the earlier texts such as the Ṣaṣṭitantra are no longer available. Vārṣagaṇya’s Ṣaṣṭitantra has been quoted in non-Sāṃkhya texts but is lost. One well-known summary of the 60 topics of the Ṣaṣṭitantra is given in the 9th-century CE Pāñcarātra text Ahirbudhnyasaṃhitā 12.20–30, but the summary presents a Vaiṣṇava tradition of Sāṃkhya. The Sāṃkhyakārikā, though, claims to contain almost the complete Ṣaṣṭitantra (SāṃK. 72).
The Sāṃkhyakārikā lays out the way of salvific liberation from suffering by means of knowledge in 72 verses (kārikās). The purpose of Sāṃkhya is religious, and the goal is to end duḥkha permanently (SāṃK. 1), that is, to attain liberation from rebirth in saṃsāra. The method to attain liberation is stated in Sāṃkhyakārikā 2 as vyaktāvyaktajñavijñāna, discriminative knowledge (vijñāna) of the manifest (vyakta), the unmanifest (avyakta), and the knower (jña). The knower is the puruṣa principle; the unmanifest, avyakta, is the material principle, pradhāna or prakṛti; and the manifest, vyakta, is the 23 principles that are the products of the association of puruṣa and prakṛti. Knowing vyaktāvyaktajña means knowing the 25 principles (tattvas), and the method to end suffering (duḥkha), according to Sāṃkhya, is to know the 25 principles, in Sāṃkhyakārikā 64 said to be the tattvābhyāsa, “analysis of the tattvas,” that leads to jñāna (salvific knowledge). When the 25 tattvas have been known, puruṣa becomes just a spectator, and the activities of prakṛti cease, and when puruṣa is separated from the body, it attains final and complete liberation (aikāntika ātyantika kaivalya; SāṃK. 68). Puruṣa is separate from the rest, it is neither created nor a product (na prakṛtir na vikṛtir puruṣaḥ; SāṃK. 3). Sāṃkhyakārikā 3 gives the primary distinctions of the material principle and its 23 products: mūlaprakṛti is uncreated (avikṛti), 7 tattvas (intellect [buddhi/mahat], egoity [ahaṃkāra] and the 5 subtle material principles [tanmātras]) are both producers and products (prakṛtivikṛti), and 16 (mind [manas], the 5 sense capacities [buddhindriyas], the 5 action capacities [karmendriyas], and the 5 gross elements [mahābhūtas]) are products (vikāra) only. Since knowledge is the means to salvific liberation, it is important to know what the means to valid knowledge (pramāṇa) are. Sāṃkhyakārikā 4–8 treats the means of valid knowledge, and they are perception, inference, and reliable testimony. One reason for inability of perception of something might be because the object is too subtle, and this is the case with prakṛti. Its existence can be inferred from the effects. The inference is possible because of the principle of satkārya, the existence of the material effect in its material cause in a potential state (SāṃK. 9). Sāṃkhyakārikā 10–19 presents the principal characteristics of vyaktāvyaktajña (the material cause, the effects, and the puruṣa principle). An important doctrine is that prakṛti is one, while puruṣas are many. The puruṣa is a witness only (sākṣitva), it is that which is “isolation” (kaivalya), it is separate from all particular experience (mādhyasthya), a spectator (draṣṭṛtva), and a nonagent (akartṛbhāva; SāṃK. 19). The most significant characteristics of prakṛti (pradhāna or avyakta) are that it is one, uncaused, independent, an object, general (sāmānya), nonconscious (acetana), productive (prasavadharmin), and constituted by the three guṇas, and that it does not refer back to a more subtle principle (aliṅga). The three guṇas sattva, rajas, and tamas are described as lightweight and illuminating (sattva), stimulating and moving (rajas), and heavy and enveloping (tamas), and they are said to function for the puruṣa as a lamp (pradīpavat; SāṃK. 13). Puruṣạ and prakṛti also have some properties in common such as being without a cause (ahetumat), enduring (nitya), all-pervasive (vyāpin), unsupported (anāśrita), not a mark of a more subtle principle (aliṅga), without parts (anavayava) and independent (aparatantra) (Jacobsen, 1999, 223–236). Inferences that are thought to prove the existence of prakṛti are given in Sāṃkhyakārikā 15 and 16. Inferences to prove the existence and the plurality of puruṣas and their characteristics are given in Sāṃkhyakārikā 15–18. Although puruṣa and prakṛti are different, their proximity or association (saṃyoga) makes them appear to be what they are not; consciousness appears as if it is active, and materiality appears as if it is conscious (SāṃK. 20, 21). Sāṃkhyakārikā 22–43 explains the characteristics, relations, and functions of the other 23 tattvas. A subtle body (liṅga) is to be distinguished from the gross body and other objects made of gross elements. The subtle body transmigrates, and by the power of prakṛti, it is able to take on any body, like a dramatic actor who can play many roles (SāṃK. 42). Sāṃkhyakārikā 44–52 presents the predispositions (bhāvas), which reside primarily in the intellect (buddhi) and the “intellectual creation” (pratyayasarga). There are eight bhāvas:

1.

dharma (meritorious behavior) leads to a better rebirth, and

2.

adharma (demeritorious behavior) leads to a worse;

3.

jñāna (knowledge) leads to salvific liberation (apavarga), and

4.

avidyā (ignorance) leads to bondage;

5.

vairāgya (detachment) leads to merging with prakṛti (prakṛtilaya), and

6.

avairāgya (attachment) to transmigration (saṃsāra);

7.

aiśvarya (power) leads to control, and

8.

anaiśvarya (lack of power) leads to lack of control (SāṃK. 44, 45).

These bhāvas manifest themselves in 50 divisions in ordinary experience, which are classified in four groups:

1.

five kinds of misconceptions (viparyaya),

2.

twenty-eight kinds of dysfunctions (aśakti),

3.

nine kinds of contentments (tuṣṭi), and

4.

eight attainments (siddhi).  

The eight attainments (siddhis) in Sāṃkhya do not refer to the famous eight powers of yoga, such as the ability to become small like an atom (aṇiman), the ability to attain weightlessness (laghiman), and so on, but they refer to proper reasoning, oral instruction, study, removal of the three kinds of suffering, discussion, and generosity (SāṃK. 51).
Sāṃkhyakārikā 53–56 describes the empirical world (bhautika sarga). There are eight classes of divinities, five classes of animals and plants, and the class of humans (SāṃK. 53). In Sāṃkhyakārikā 54, the god Brahmā is mentioned as part of the uppermost class of divinities. The existence of divinities is part of the Sāṃkhya view, as shown in these two kārikās. Also, since the creation proceeds from the association of the puruṣa principle and the material principle, all creation is based on persons, and the material world that is common seems to be caused by the manifestation of the tattvas of the creator god Brahmā, who himself is an association of puruṣa and prakṛti. In later Sāṃkhya, this divinity is not called Brahmā but Īśvara. In Sāṃkhyasūtra 3.56 and 3.57, one who has been perfect in the bhāva called vairāgya (detachment), which leads to merging with prakṛti, is explained to be the omnipotent and omniscient god of the next creation. It leads to omnipotence in the next creation, and the existence of such Īśvara is a settled doctrine in Sāṃkhya, according to the Sāṃkhyasūtra (see SāṃS. 3.56; 3.57). The Yuktidīpikā names such a divine being the Māhātmyaśarīra. In Tattvavaiśāradī, Vācaspatimiśra comments on the highest class of divinities, that “at their wish the sattva, rajas, and tamas come into activity.” Sāṃkhya is not a philosophy whose main purpose is to understand the divine, as are the philosophies of bhakti and the Hindu schools of theology, since the way to attain salvific liberation according to Sāṃkhya is knowledge of the difference between puruṣa and prakṛti, and not devotion to a savior god, and the goal is not identity or unity with god, but the divine world is nevertheless an accepted part of reality according to philosophical Sāṃkhya. This point is often misunderstood. The existence of gods is not a main focus of the philosophy of Sāṃkhya, and their existence is mostly irrelevant from the point of view of salvific liberation, but their existence is nevertheless fully accepted. But the gods are part of the universe and are not beyond puruṣa and prakṛti. The gods emerge as creation emerges from prakṛti. The first products of prakṛti are buddhi and ahaṃkāra, which are mental principles, and they therefore have to be in association with someone’s puruṣa, and this someone must be a divine being. In the nonphilosophical Sāṃkhya of the Purāṇas, this god can be Śiva or Viṣṇu. However, the purpose of classical Sāṃkhya is to make possible a way to salvific liberation, not to explain the divinities.
Sāṃkhyakārikā 57–61 gives similes that illustrate the doctrine that prakṛti functions for the salvific liberation of puruṣa and that the manifestations of prakṛti disappear once its true nature has been known.
Sāṃkhyakārikā 62–69 is about liberation of the puruṣa principle. The puruṣa is not really bound but is always separate. It is only the products of prakṛti that transmigrate, and it is prakṛti that is the cause of both bondage and salvific liberation. Jñāna is part of prakṛti, not puruşa, as jñāna is one of the eight bhāvas.
Sāṃkhyakārikā 70–72 describes the traditional teaching of the transmission of knowledge from the greatest sage to Āsuri to Pañcaśikha and states that all the subjects of the Śaṣṭitantra except one have been treated in the Sāṃkhyakārikā, not the narratives and illustrations (ākhyāyikā; for Skt. text and trans. of the Sāṃkhyakārikā, see Larson, 1979, 255–277). Interestingly, one of the books of the Sāṃkhyasūtra (book 4) is called the section of narratives and illustrations (Ākhyāyikādhyāya) and shows the continuous importance of similes for the Sāṃkhya teaching.

Later Sāṃkhya

As already mentioned, nonphilosophical Sāṃkhya has continued to flourish from the period of the theistic Upaniṣads, the Kaṭhopaniṣạd and Śvetāśvataropaniṣad, and Mahābhārata up to the present. Its most important textual traditions are found in the Purāṇas. One of the most elaborate presentations of this Sāṃkhya is the chapters of the Bhāgavatapurāṇa called the Kapilagītā or Kapilopadeśa (BhāgP. 3.25–33), but Sāṃkhya is presented also in a number of other places in the Bhāgavatapurāṇa. The presentation of Sāṃkhya in the Bhāgavatapurāṇa is characterized by the attempt to unify the different traditions of Sāṃkhya, which is a characteristic of Vaiṣṇava Sāṃkhya in general. Bhāgavatapurāṇa book 11, chapter 22, refers to different schools of Sāṃkhya that believed there were in total 9, 11, 5, 26, 25, 7, 6, 4, 17, 16, and 13 principles (tattvas). Kṛṣṇa in the text tries to reconcile all of them, by stating that
"the different enumeration of the categories is due to the varying kinds of subsumption of the lower categories into the higher or by the omission of the higher ones" (Dasgupta, 1991, vol. IV, 45).
Bhāgavatapurāṇa promotes the view that there are no conflicting views among the different schools of Sāṃkhya. In the conclusion of the discussion of the different schools, Bhāgavatapurāṇa states that different sages have held various views on the number of principles (tattvas), but that all these different enumerations are justified and reasonable, and that they all agree that the purpose is not to enumerate the principles exactly, but to distinguish puruṣa from them (BhāgP. 11.22.25). All the viewpoints are unified in theistic Sāṃkhya.
The Sāṃkhya of Kapilagītā is also a Sāṃkhya tradition promoted by a figure called Kapila. This Kapila teaches Sāṃkhya to his own mother, Devahūti. The goal is to realize brahman, which is attained by devotion to god, as is the theistic Sāṃkhya of the Upaniṣads. The real sādhus are those who are without attachments to anything except Viṣṇu. One should seek their company, and by practicing renunciation and listening to the stories of Viṣṇu told by the sādhus, one develops faith (BhāgP. 3.25.24–25). The yoga of devotion here means constantly thinking of the deeds of Viṣṇu, and such devotion destroys ignorance. Kapila states that some do not want mokṣa, but delight in sevā of god, but they also attain salvific liberation, even if they do not care about it (BhāgP. 3.25.36). Nevertheless, Kapila starts the teaching of the tattvas by stating that by knowing (jñāna) the tattvas, the puruṣa is freed from the guṇas of prakṛti (BhāgP. 3.26.1–2). The puruṣa here is both the self and the supreme god, who is emphasized as a creator god, as is typical of the presentation of Sāṃkhya in the theistic context of the Purāṇas. Puruṣa “as part of his free will, has accepted the subtle, divine prakṛti constituted of the three guṇas as part of his līlā” (BhāgP. 3.26.3; trans. Tagare). In the teaching of Kapilagītā, prakṛti is not an independent principle but a power of Viṣṇu. Time (kāla) is also a power of Viṣṇu and a separate principle, the 25th tattva (kālaḥ pañcaviṃśakaḥ; BhāgP. 3.26.15), and plays an important role in the cosmogony. God uses kāla to set in motion the original equilibrium of the guṇas, according to this teaching. Contrary to Sāṃkhya of the Sāṃkhyakārikā, the tattvas are here explained as cosmic principles and identified with gods. The presentation of the cosmic principles is close to the Pāñcarātra theology. Citta is the mahat principle and is identified with Vāsudeva, ahaṃkāra with Saṃkarṣana, and manas with Aniruddha. The buddhi is a different principle from mahat. The principles are divine, cosmic, and personal. The world creator together with kāla, karman, and guṇas entered the seven principles of mahat, ahaṃkāra, and the five mahābhūtas, and out of this came the cosmic egg surrounded by the elements and covered on the outside of pradhāna/prakṛti. God then rose from the golden egg, lying on water; he pierced space, and mouth evolved, from mouth speech, and from speech fire. Two nostrils evolved, from those evolved smell, and from it the sense of smell and breath (prāṇa), and from smell Vāyu evolved. Then the two eyes, the sense of seeing and the sun, then the ears, sense of hearing and the presiding deities of the directions. A detailed description of creation from the egg of the rest of the body of the primeval being Virāj follows. Then the gods try to activate Virāj, but only when kṣetrajña enters the hearth of Virāj did he become alive and rise from the water (see BhāgP. 3.26.52- 72).
In the teaching of this Kapila, the Sāṃkhya teaching is combined with the practice of yoga. Developing dispassion for everything, even rebirth in Brahmaloka, and giving up attachment to the yoga powers (siddhis), by the grace of god, jñāna and bhakti are realized, and the final goal, called kaivalya, is attained. Bhāgavatapurāṇa 3.28 describes the eightfold yoga, which prepares one for meditation on the complete form of god (Viṣṇu); 3.29 describes the way of renunciant bhakti and the power of time; 3.30 describes saṃsāra and suffering in hell; 3.31 describes sufferings of the jīva; 3.32 describes the excellence of bhaktiyoga; and finally 3.33 describes Devahūti’s asceticism and realization of kaivalya.
A dominant theme of the text is renunciation and a negative view of the body, which implies also a recommendation of female renunciation. The fact that Kapila teaches renunciation to his mother makes the text a prescription for female asceticism. “A woman,” says the text, ”is the māyā created by God.” One should look upon her as one’s death, “like a deep pit covered by grass” (BhāgP. 3.31.40). But similarly, a woman who wants salvific liberation should look at a man who thinks he is her husband as māyā. Just as the song of the hunter is death to a deer, similarly, husband, children, and home are just māyā to a woman (BhāgP. 3.31.42). Devahūti became a renunciant, meditated on the form of Viṣṇu, and by means of devotion, powerful renunciation, and knowledge, she attained purity of mind, transcended the jīva, neglected the body, and became filthy like a fire covered with smoke. She was so deeply absorbed in Vāsudeva that she was not conscious of the body. Continuing in this way, she attained brahman, the state called nirvāṇa at the place Siddhapada, and her body was, according to the Bhāgavatapurāṇa, transformed into a river (3.33.24–37), a statement typical of the Purāṇas, a group of texts closely associated with the development of Hindu sacred geography and pilgrimage (Jacobsen, forthcoming b).
The Kapilagītā tradition is theistic, and cosmogony is an important feature of this tradition of Sāṃkhya. As is often the case in the Purāṇas, the Sāṃkhya categories are utilized to explain the creation of the world, which in the Purāṇas was considered an important function of the divine. Sāṃkhya in this text promotes an ideology of renunciation and is combined with Yoga. The text seems to be an attempt to systematize theistic nonphilosophical Sāṃkhya, perhaps, with the view that this was the original and real Sāṃkhya teaching of Kapila.
As a response perhaps to the Kapilagītā and the dialogue of Kapila and Devahūti, a text describing the dialogue of Kapila and Āsuri, Kapilāsurisaṃvāda, was composed and inserted into some manuscripts of the southern recension of the Mahābhārata. This Kapilāsurisaṃvāda presents a Sāṃkhya philosophy related to the Sāṃkhyakārikā and some of the Sāṃkhya texts of the Mahābhārata, but with some differences (see Jacobsen, 2008, 82–132, for the text and trans. of the Kapilāsurisaṃvāda). In the Kapilāsurisaṃvāda, sometimes more than 25 principles (tattvas) are listed. Buddhi is sometimes called the second puruṣa, and ahaṃkāra the third puruṣa. The terms buddha (the awakened self ), budhyamāna (the intellect), and apratibuddha (the material principle) are used as technical terms, and several issues, such as karmayonis (sources of action), that are not mentioned in Sāṃkhyakārikā, but are discussed in the commentaries are taken up for discussion, and the concept of tanmātra is not used. The text confirms that Sāṃkhya always was a pluralistic phenomenon in India (Jacobsen, 2008, 78–79).
The examples of Kapilagītā of Bhāgavatapurāṇa and Kapilāsurisaṃvāda found in some manuscripts of the southern recension of the Mahābhārata show that there was a variety of interpretations of Sāṃkhya also after the Sāṃkhyakārikā. It is usually accepted that openness to the greatest possible plurality is the best approach in the investigation of the earliest history of Sāṃkhya, but this openness for plurality of traditions might also be a good attitude for understanding the later history of Sāṃkhya and the contemporary situation.
The 14th–16th centuries saw a renaissance of Sāṃkhya associated with the texts Tattvasamāsasūtra (also known as Kāpilasūtra) and Sāṃkhyasūtra of Kapila, and commentaries on these texts. The Sāṃkhyasūtra by Kapila is the most important text of the period. It is first encountered with the commentary of Aniruddha, who might have been its author (Larson & Bhattacharya, 1987, 327). Vijñānabhikṣu wrote commentaries on the Sāṃkhyasūtra and the Brahmasūtra and summaries of both Sāṃkhya and Yoga texts. His philosophy seems close to the Hinduism of the Purāṇas, and he adopted the approach of the Bhāgavatapurāṇa of unifying all viewpoints, including philosophical Sāṃkhya and the nonphilosophical Sāṃkhya, the Upaniṣads and Vedānta, and also the Bhāgavatapurāṇa. S. Dasgupta noted that the emotional bhakti promoted by Vijñānabhikṣu is different from the earlier bhakti but “is found in the Bhāgavata-purāṇa” (Dasgupta, 1991, vol. III, 451), and S. Dasgupta thinks that Vijñānabhikṣu was “one of the earliest, if not the earliest exponent of emotionalism in theism, if we do not take into account the Purāṇic emotionalism of the Bhāgavata-purāṇa” ( Dasgupta, 1991, 451). There are many similarities of the Sāṃkhya of Vijñānabhikṣu with the Sāṃkhya of Kapilagītā and the Bhāgavatapurāṇa, such as the role of time (kāla) as an eternal power brought into operation by the will of god, god as the mover of the equilibrium of the guņas of prakṛti, bhakti as the way to realize god, god as the inner controller (antaryāmin), and creation as god’s līlā .

Kapila 

One thing that the different Sāṃkhya interpretations have in common, both the nonphilosophical or “undifferentiated” Sāṃkhya and the technical school of Sāṃkhya darśana, in addition to the terminology, the method of enumeration, and the belief in the power of salvific knowledge, is an association with the name Kapila as the founding teacher. Whatever the origin was of the association of Kapila with Sāṃkhya, nothing is known about the supposed founder as a historical person. One problem is that several Kapilas are mentioned in the ancient Indian religious traditions. Traditions differ on who the student of Kapila was, who his parents were, of which god he was a manifestation, and the deeds ascribed to him. In addition, the word kapila and kapilā (red-brown) was given to places, rivers, and also a special type of cow that was favored as a gift to Brahmans at places of pilgrimage. Places named after the color, the river, or the cow were sometimes later associated with the ascetic Kapila. Several places in contemporary India claim to be connected to a sage Kapila, and some of these are also important centers of pilgrimage (see Jacobsen, 2008, 149–188). There were perhaps one or more yakṣas called Kapila, which may have given name to some places today associated with the sage Kapila, but there is probably no single source for all the references to Kapila (Jacobsen, 2008). The Sāṃkhya terminology and system of enumeration are from the time of the Mahābhārata associated with the sage Kapila, and even the Sāṃkhyasūtra and the Tattvasamāsasūtra (Kāpilasūtra), both 14th- to 15th-century texts, claimed Kapila as their author. If a person named Kapila composed the Sāṃkhyasūtra or the Tattvasamāsasūtra, he must have been a different person from the Kapila who presumably discovered the truth of Sāṃkhya more than two thousand years earlier. The name Kapila may also have been added as the author by someone else, intending the name Kapila to refer to the same person as the founder and thus attempting to provide Sāṃkhya with an authentic Sūtra text.
The Sāṃkhya tradition identified the sage Kapila as its founder, and he became associated with different ideas of divinity as these ideas developed in India, such as avatāra and the divine guru. The Sāṃkhyakārikā does not mention the name Kapila but says that the teaching was proclaimed by the greatest sage (paramarṣi; SāṃK. 69) and the excellent, pure sage (pavitram agryaṃ munir; SāṃK. 70). The commentaries, however, agree that this sage was Kapila. Sāṃkhyakārikā says paramarṣi gave the teaching to Āsuri, and Āsuri gave it to Pañcaśikha. Although the names Āsuri and Pañcaśikha appear in the Mahābhārata, quite contradictory views and identities are ascribed to them, making it impossible to identify them (see Larson & Bhattacharya, 1987, 107–123). In the Sāṃkhya philosophical commentary tradition, there are different views of Kapila, but he is generally considered to be divine. Several of the texts proclaim that Kapila was born at the beginning of the manifestation (ādisarga) perfectly equipped with knowledge, virtue, nonattachment, and power. According to Yuktidīpikā, Kapila appeared directly from the material principle, but the commentary of Gauḍapāda holds that Kapila was a mind-born son of Brahmā (SāṃK. 1). In Vaiṣṇava texts, Kapila is presented as an avatāra of Viṣṇu. Especially important is the Kapilagītā of the Bhāgavatapurāṇa, and it is notable that several of the philosophical commentaries on Sāṃkhyakārikā also promoted the avatāra doctrine, but probably only the commentaries that appeared after the Bhāgavatapurāṇa (800 CE). Vācaspatimiśra (c. 850–950) in the Tattvavaiśāradī, in his commentary on Yogasūtra 1.25, states that Kapila was an avatāra of Viṣṇu. Also the Māṭharavṛtti (SāṃK. 1) refers to Kapila as an avatāra. These two commentaries are dated to the 9th century CE, and by this time, the Sāṃkhya commentaries had accepted Kapila as an avatāra of Viṣṇu, perhaps influenced by the Vaiṣṇava traditions of the Purāṇas. That Kapila was an avatāra of Viṣṇu is proclaimed in a number of Purāṇas.
In the Bhagavadgītā, Kṛṣṇa says that among the perfected sages (siddhas), he is the sage (muni) Kapila (siddhānāṃ kapilo muniḥ; BhG. 10.26), but since there are several Kapilas mentioned in the Mahābhārata, it is difficult to know which Kapila is referred to. The Kapila who proclaims Sāṃkhya in the Bhāgavatapurāṇa was the son of Kardama and Devahūti, who, when he was a child, instructed his mother in the Sāṃkhya teaching of renunciation and salvific liberation. But Bhāgavatapurāṇa also knows another Kapila, different from the teacher of Devahūti, the teacher Kapila who taught Sāṃkhya to Āsuri (pañcamaḥ kapilo nāma siddheśa kālaviplutam, provācāsuraye sāṃkhyaṃ tattvagrāmavinirṇayaṃ [1.3.10]). The Ahirbudhnyasaṃhitā, which includes much Sāṃkhya material, mentions Kapila among the 39 avatāras of Viṣṇu. The text considers Kapila to be the founder of Sāṃkhya and the author of the Ṣaṣṭitantra. In the well-known story of the descent of the river Gaṅgā told in the epics and the Purāṇas, it is said that Viṣṇu incarnated as Kapila to kill the sons of Sagara. Among the other Kapilas mentioned in the epics and the Purāṇas are the fourth son of an Agni called Bhānu, a sage who was the father of Śalihotra, a son of Viśvamitra, a son of Dadhivāhana, the son of Prahlāda, one of the serpent kings that uphold the earth, one or more yakṣas, and so on.
There seems perhaps to be a connection between the name Kapila and ideas favored in the Śramaṇa milieu, such as noninjury ( ahiṃsā ) and renunciation ( saṃnyāsa ). A Buddhist tradition claims that the city of the Buddha, Kapilavastu, was inhabited by a sage Kapila who gave name to the place, but this assumed relationship between Kapilavastu and the name Kapila is a later and constructed tradition. In the Pali canon, the name Kapila is hardly mentioned and seems to be just a name. One Brahman priest named Kapila is mentioned in Jātaka 422, Ceitiya Jātaka, and two monks named Kapila are mentioned in Vinayapiṭaka (3.67; 3.107; Horner’s footnote to the name Kapila in Vinayapiṭaka 3.67 advises, “Mentioned, I think, nowhere but here” [The Book of Discipline, vol. I, 113]). A few other Kapilas are mentioned in the commentary literature on the Buddhist Pali texts, but also here hardly more than the name. One Kapila who teaches asceticism is mentioned in the Jain text Uttarādhayanasūtra 8. There is no Sāṃkhya terminology in this Kapila’s teaching. In Baudhāyanadharmasūtra 2.11.28, the name Kapila is associated with the foundation of the āśrama system, and in the Mahābhārata, a sage Kapila criticizes the sacrifice and argues for renunciation. Like the Śramaṇas, this Kapila argues that a true Brahman is he who has restrained himself, is free from desire, practices ahiṃsā, and sees himself in all creatures (MBh. 12.260–262). One researcher has argued that Kapila was a god in the culture of the Greater Magadha (Bronkhorst, 2007a, 61–68), but the lack of evidence for this in the early texts of Jainism and Buddhism and the almost total absence of the name Kapila in the Pali canon make this unlikely.
The name Kapila is associated with more than one figure, it seems to have been not an uncommon name, and it is not possible to identify which one is the presumed founder of Sāṃkhya. The problem of there being more than one Kapila was recognized not only by the Bhāgavatapurāṇa but also by Śaṅkara. Śankara, commenting on Brahmasūtra 2.1.1, assumed that the word kapila used in Śvetāśvataropaniṣad 5.2 is a reference to a person Kapila, but this Kapila, he claimed, was not Kapila the founder of Sāṃkhya but the sage Kapila who killed the sons of King Sagara, which caused the need for the river Gaṅgā to come to earth. The traditions associated with Kapila also usually distinguish among several Kapilas, as do scholars (Bronkhorst, 2007a, 63; Dasgupta, 1991, vol. IV, 38; Jacobsen, 2008). But an assumption that every mention of the name Kapila refers to the same figure can also be found, despite the number of different Kapilas mentioned in the Indian religious texts and traditions, which in some cases can be easily distinguished, because different family relationships or identities are pointed out in the texts.

Contemporary Sāṃkhya 

Sāṃkhya is a theoretical and historical subject taught at the universities in India in the Indian philosophy classes in the philosophy departments and is explained in numerous scholarly books, but attainment of the salvific goal of the systems is not the concern in these academic contexts. That there is no reliable description of a continuous Sāṃkhya philosophical tradition as a spiritual practice in Indian history probably means that there were no centralized Sāṃkhya monastic institutions. It probably also means that there were few practitioners of Sāṃkhya. Sāṃkhya traditions have perhaps been revived several times in Indian history. One of these revivals was in late 19th- and early 20th-century Bengal by Hariharananda Aranya (1869–1947) and the tradition of Kāpil Maṭh in Jharkhand. Kāpil Maṭh is one of a few institutionalized living Sāṃkhya traditions that follows the Sāṃkhya tradition. Pātañjala Yoga is considered a Sāṃkhya tradition, and Sāṃkhya and Pātañjala Yoga are blended in Sāṃkhyayoga. Kāpil Maṭh is an important lineage in the academic study of Sāṃkhyayoga. A significant part of the scholarship on Sāṃkhya and Pātañjala Yoga in the 20th century has been produced by disciples and scholars associated with the Kāpil Maṭh (see Jacobsen, forthcoming a).
Sanskrit commentaries on the Sāṃkhya texts have been produced continuously also in the 19th and 20th centuries (for summaries of these, see Larson & Bhattacharya, 1987). Several 20th- and 21st-century teachers and traditions in India belong to the Sāmkhya traditions. There are several monasteries that worship Kapila as the teacher of the Sāṃkhya philosophy of the Kapilagītā of the Bhāgavatapurāṇa and follow this teaching of Kṛṣṇa bhakti. There are pilgrimage places associated with Kapila, both Kapila of the systematic philosophy of the Sāṃkhyakārikā and the nonphilosophical Sāṃkhya of the Mahābhārata and the Purāṇas, and of the Kapila who taught the Sāṃkhya of Kṛṣṇa bhakti. In the yoga traditions that were invented in the 20th century and in the global yoga movements, Patañjali’s Yogasūtra is an important sacred text, but there is often little or no recognition that Pātañjala Yoga originally was a school of Sāṃkhya.

Conclusion 

The plurality of Sāṃkhya traditions, both in history and in contemporary Hinduism, is much larger than what is presented as Sāṃkhya in much of the academic literature on Sāṃkhya darśana. Before the distinct Sāṃkhya schools developed, there was a plurality of Sāṃkhya traditions. The term “sāṃkhya” now most often refers to the Sāṃkhya tradition of Sāṃkhyakārikā and the tradition of philosophical commentaries on that text. However, there continued to be several different traditions of Sāṃkhya also after the Sāṃkhyakārikā and the Yogasūtra and Vyāsabhāṣya, Theistic Sāṃkhya traditions seem to have continued to flourish, unbridled by the Sāṃkhyakārikā tradition. In addition, Sāṃkhya terminology merged with theistic and monistic philosophies and theologies. The theistic Sāṃkhya traditions thrived in the Purāṇas, and in lengthy presentations of Sāṃkhya in the Purāṇas, Sāṃkhya ideas and the theistic theology blended within different theological frameworks.