Yukteswar Teachings 6

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Yukteswar's Samkhya Philosophy

Yukteswar's Samkhya Philosophy

His Gospel

Yukteswar enumerates twenty-five elements of an ancient scheme of the yoga-allied samkhya philosophy.

The word "gospel" in the West is taken to mean something else than 'veda'. The Sanskrit word 'veda' comes from 'vid', to know. The first chapter in Yukteswar's book is called "The Gospel". In the sections of it, Yukteswar presents a brief and terse Sanskrit quotation - a sutra - first, next comments it, and then rounds off by a quotation from the Bible, and not always from the Revelation of John. This sectional approach is repeated on and on.

Yukteswar's First Sutra

The first sutra (literally: thread, i.e., aphorism) of Yukteswar in Chapter 1 runs like this:

Parambrahma (Spirit or God) is everlasting, complete, without beginning or end. It is one, invisible Being [Yukteswar, Hos 21].

The translation is provided by SRF, it is mentioned in a footnote on that place. And now is the time to stop and think a while:

Are there any nuts to crack at this place?

(1) Well, we are into an exposition of samkhya philosophy, where "the existence of a god is not hypothesized" [Encyclopedia Britannica, s.v. "Samkhya"]. And it is a traditional view that samkhya (sankhya) is not theistic. We bring more on that subject further down.
(2) The yoga philosophical system (darsan) of Hinduism allows for God, though, and the yoga system is closely allied to samkhya. And the God that the yoga system (of Patanjali) speaks of is Ishwar (Iswara), "God of Light", roughly said. Yukteswar's monastic name is derived from Iswar. 'Sri Yukteswar' means "Holy United-with-Light-God (Iswara)", for your information. And in his case, Sri forms an integral part of the monk's name, we are informed. With most swami names, 'sri' is just added as needs be.
Samkhya got its classical form and expression in the Samkhya-karikas by Isvarakrisna (c. 3rd century AD). Samkhya enumerates proposed constituents of the cosmos, and samkhya-like speculations are found in early Jain, Buddhist and Hindu texts that some call brahmanical speculations. These and medical speculation are thought to arise out of a common ideological context where samhkya-like enumeration of the categories (of the cosmos) is central, writes Gavin Flood [Ith 232].
Flood also finds there are striking parallells between the later samkhya philosophy, medical systems of Ayurveda, and Buddhist systems. And the earliest enumeration of cosmic principles in the brahmanical tradition comes with the Chandogya Upanishad. The enumeration of categories is also found in the Katha Upanishad and Svetasvatara Upanishad. Also, presystematic listings of elements of experience and world are found in the Mahabharata, and the Bhagavad Gita, which forms a part of the Mahabharata [Ith 233-34].
Flood further writes:

Samkhya is also an an atheistic system, whereas the yoga darsana [philosophical system] admits of the idea of God or the Lord (Isvara) as a special kind of self (purusa) which has never been entangled in prakriti [matter, the universal and subtle (i.e., unmanifest) matter, or nature] . . . These theistic tendencies are developed in the later tradition and the sixteenth-century theologian Vijnanabhiksu, while acknowledging that the system does not need it, argues that the idea of a Lord is not irreconcilable with the earlier Samkhya view. [Emphasis added] [Gavin Flood, Ith 235]

A Map

Samkhya holds the belief that there are many separate purushas ("selves"). When a purusha (at first without an object) draws to itself prakriti forms or facets, the higher mind (also called the mahat, "great one" or "spiritual awareness", or buddhi) is first evolved. Next a deep ego consciousness (ahamkara) is evolved. The ego consciousness is faceted into five gross elements (space, air, fire, water, earth), five subtle (fine) elements (sound, touch, sight, taste, smell), five organs of perception (with which to hear, touch, see, taste, smell), and five organs of activity (with which to speak, grasp, move, procreate, evacuate), and mind (manas). See the figure.

Figure: The twenty-five samkhya tattwas (constituents)

Yukteswar's study accepts a God, a Supreme Being, which samkhya has not fitted into its special cosmological system. Moreover, the author includes many more central concepts into his overall scheme, and they are not found in samkhya proper, as far as we know. The sources we have consulted, comprise An Introduction to Hinduism by Gavin Flood, An Introduction to Indian Philosophy by Satischandra Chatterjee and Dhirendramohan Datta, The Spiritual Heritage of India by Swami Prabhavananda, and an article by Professor Surendranath Bhattacharya in The Cultural Heritage of India, Vol. 3. Also, Hinduism by R. C. Zaehner, and A Survey of Hinduism by Klaus K. Klostermaier [Ith 231-36; Wo 251-88; Ins 208-25; Xmm 41-52; Him 67-73, 76-80; and Sf 357-62].
A question that seems needed, is: "Is Yukteswar really writing about samkhya proper?" He says he does, and yet his overall "samkhya scheme" does not fall into the conventional models we have seen. Some parts (concepts) are identical. A visual presentation of his conceptual scheme is furnished in the SRF edition, but it is (too) difficult to understand for persons without much knowledge of technical Sanskrit terms.
And since the author does not indicate his Sanskrit sources - verse by verse - in the book, we are in effect barred from investigating the "backbone" of the book today. The burden of proof rests with the author/publisher; the relevant Sanskrit verses need to be annotated in any decent, academic study of this sort.

Is Kaivalya, Aloofness, His Goal?

The title and last part of Yukteswar's book show that liberation is "aloneness", or "aloofness" kaivalya, which is a samkhya term. The kaivalya (separatedness) means liberation from "the wheel of transmigration" in Patanjali's yoga system [Ith 97].
Yet in samkhya, kaivalya (liberation) is

the discriminative knowledge that pure consciousness is eternally distinct from primordial matter; there is only a proximity between them . . . Discrimination allows consciousness to distinguish the self from what is not the self, and so to perceive that the self was never actually bound to matter. This self is transcendent, the silent witness behind the embodied subject of first-person predicates . . . in the Samkhya system the dualism is between the self (purusha) and matter which embraces what in traditional western philosophy has been called 'mind' . . . the true self is beyond. [Gavin Flood, Ith 234]

Since the self defined above is utterly outside the realm of the world and its definitions, discrimination will have nothing to work on to get into the self. The self is not to be found through splendid discrimination, in other words. That may be assented through logic. Flood overlooks or ignores this sweet and neat little point; that discrimination lacks the needed conditions or premises and stuff to accomplish what old thinkers maintained it could.
Yukteswar presents kaivalya (the soul's "divorce" from the universe) as liberation, as the goal. What he further puts into the ancient term, and whether he appears to side more with Patanjali than with Kapila (the accredited founder of samkhya), may have to wait for a while for a discussion.

"The one religious consequence of the Samkhya-Yoga is an emphasis on austere asceticism and a turning away from [many] ritualistic elements . . . Though they continue to remain as an integral part of the Hindu faith, no major religious order thrived on the basis of these philosophies," says the encyclopaedia. [Ebu "Indian philosophy"]

Yukteswar's stand and tradition is that strict control according to the twin philosophies samkhya and yoga, yields gratifying happiness [Ay ch. 14]. And let it be mentioned in passing that according to the author, the Holy Ghost is "Kutastha Chaitanya . . . Purushottama" [Hos 26]. Such a much deviant definition of "The Holy Spirit" of the Gospels cannot be right in the Christian terminology. We have presented New Testament understanding of The Holy Spirit (or Ghost) on another page. There is room for more. [LINK]

Literature

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Sailendra Das Gupta: "Kriya Yoga and Sri Yukteswar"

Literature

Ak: Yogananda, Pa.: Man's Eternal Quest. SRF. Los Angeles, 1975.
   Ay: Yogananda, Paramahansa. Autobiography of a Yogi. 1st ed. New York: Philosophical Library, 1946. Online. [oaks.nvg.org/pv6bk12.html]
Ebu: Encyclopaedia Britannica. Encyclopaedia Britannica 2006 Ultimate Reference Suite DVD. London: Encyclopaedia Britannica, 2006.
Ha: Yogananda, Pa.: Autobiography of a Yogi. 12th ed. Self-Realization Fellowship (SRF). Los Angeles, 1981.
   Him: Zaehner, R. C.: Hinduism. 2nd ed. Oxford University Press. London, 1966.
Hos: Yukteswar, sw: The Holy Science. 7th ed. Self-Realization Fellowship (SRF), Los Angeles, 1972.
   Ins: Prabhavananda, sw: The Spiritual Heritage of India. 2nd ed. Vedanta. Hollywood, 1969.
Ith: Flood, Gavin: An introduction to Hinduism. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge, 1996.
Mux: Bühler, G. tr: The Laws of Manu. Banarsidass (Reprint from Oxford University's 1886-edition). Delhi, 1984.
   Pa: Yogananda, Pa.: Autobiography of a Yogi. 11th ed. Self-Realization Fellowship (SRF). Los Angeles, 1971.
Say: Yogananda, Pa.: Sayings of Yogananda. Self-Realization Fellowship. Los Angeles, 1958.
   Scf: Yogananda, Pa.: Scientific Healing Affirmations. Self-Realization Fellowship. Los Angeles, 1958.
   Scp: Yogananda, Pa.: The Science of Religion. Self-Realization Fellowship. Los Angeles, 1953.
   Sf: Klaus K. Klostermaier: A Survey of Hinduism. State University of New York Press. Albany, N.Y, 1989.
Sob: Self-Realization Fellowship: Paramahansa Yogananda in Memoriam. SRF. Los Angeles, 1958.
   Viom: Jolly, Julius tr: The Institutes of Vishnu. Banarsidass. Delhi, 1965.
   Wo: Chatterjee, Satischandra and Datta, Dhirendramohan: An Introduction to Indian Philosophy. 7th ed. University of Calcutta. Calcutta, 1968.
Xm: Radhakrishnan, S. ed: The Cultural Heritage of India, Vol. 3. Rev. ed. Ramakrishna Institute. Calcutta, 1953.

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