of primordial Being: puruÓsaor consciousness—the true Self—and prakÓrti
or materiality—the experienceable world, including one’s own body/
mind. PrakÓrtiexists for the sake of puruÓsa; their conjunction serves the
puruÓsa’s“recognition of the Self-natures of the two powers” [YS 2.23;
SK 21]. Their conjunction ends when it has caused “knowledge of nature
of the knower,” which is ultimate spiritual freedom [YBh 2.23]. This lib-
eration, called ‘independence’ (kaivalya), is achieved with the individual
puruÓsa’srecognition of its Self-nature as consciousness, wholly indepen-
dent of prakÓrtiand all its material evolutes, including the human mind
and body, and everything else in the manifest universe.
The co-presence of prakÓrtiand puruÓsaengenders the manifest world
by disturbing the equilibrium of the guÓnas, the three main forces of mat-
ter/energy comprising all physical things and processes. The guÓnasare:
- Sattva: purity, illumination and awareness
- Rajas: activity
- Tamas: stability and inertia [SK 12–21]
The guÓnasare also the three qualitiescharacterizing all things. In Yoga,
states of mind are described as sattvic, rajasic, and tamasic[TV 1.1, YBh
1.2]. “Mental essence is by nature purity; but it puts on impurity by the
taint of disturbing energy (rajas) and inertia (tamas)” [YBh 1.16]. To say
that puruÓsais pureconsciousness is to say that it is awareness entirely in-
dependent of prakÓrtiand the guÓnas. It is awareness without an object ex-
ternal to itself, and without an external object, consciousness can be con-
scious of itself. The individual puruÓsain ordinary human life fails to
recognize itself as pure consciousness, because “even though pure [of
mental contents], it cognizes by reflecting or imitating the contents of the
mind” [YS 2.20]. PuruÓsabecomes aware of itself by ‘reflecting’ the bud-
dhior intelligence, which presents objects of knowledge to the puruÓsa.
The Tattva-vai ́sarad ̄ ̄ı clarifies with an analogy:
Although the moon is not as a matter of fact transferred into pure water,
it is, so to speak, transferred into it. So also, the power of consciousness,
although it is not actually transferred into the buddhi, yet it is, so to
speak, transferred into it, because it is reflected into it.
TV 2.20Metaphysics and soteriology are intimately related in classical Yoga. Es-
sential elements of Yoga’s metaphysics and soteriology are these recipro-
cal functions:
classical yoga as a religious therapeutic 95