rite of expiation (prayashchitta); and
after eclipsesor other highly inauspi-
cious times. For further information see
Pandurang Vaman Kane, A History of
Dharmasastra, 1968; and Raj Bali
Pandey, Hindu Samskaras, 1969. The
former is encyclopedic and the latter
more accessible; despite their age, they
remain the best sources on traditional
Hindu rites.
Sacrifice
Generally a rite involving a sacred fire
and, often, an offeringin that fire. This
sort of ritual is rooted in the oldest part
of the Hindu tradition, although it has
undergone some profound changes,
particularly in the decline of animal sac-
rifice. This sort of sacrificial rite is
known as a yajna.
Sadachara
(“practice of good [people]”) One of the
traditional sources for determining reli-
gious duty (dharma) for matters not
treated in the dharma literature, or for
cases in which the literature itself gave
conflicting opinions. This was the least
authoritative source of dharma, after the
Vedas (the oldest Hindu scriptures) and
the dharma literature. Sadachara recog-
nizes that life has many ambiguities and
uncertainties, and at the same time pro-
vides a resource for determining the
appropriate action, by taking as a model
the practice of established and upright
people. Another term to designate this
sort of authority was shishtachara, the
“practice of learned [people].”
Sadasatkhyati
(“discrimination of the unreal as the
real”) Theory of errorpropounded by
the Samkhyaphilosophical school. All
theories of error attempt to explain why
people make errors in judgment, the
stock example being of mistaking the
silvery flash of a sea shell for a piece of
silver. The Samkhya theory of error is
based on dualistic metaphysics, in
which the fundamental error comes in
confusing purusha and prakrti—
roughly, spirit and nature—which are
the sources of all things. These are the
two Samkhya first principles—purusha
as conscious witness, and prakrti as
insentient matter—which are always
separate from each other, and whose
attributes can never coincide. For the
Samkhyas, the fundamental error is to
confuse these two completely different
principles—that is, to attribute powers
of motion and development to purusha,
and consciousness to prakrti. Purusha is
conceived as conscious, but completely
inactive and unchanging. It is the pas-
sive witness to the myriad transforma-
tions of prakrti going on around it.
This initial misidentification causes
the evolutionof the entire world, both
the interior, subjective world and the
exterior world the subject perceives.
Against this background, confusing the
shell for silver is just an extension of this
original mistake and is rooted in it.
According to the Samkhyas, perfect
knowledge would protect one from all
sorts of errors, both cosmic and mun-
dane. For further information see Karl
H. Potter (ed.), Presuppositions of India’s
Philosophies, 1972.Sadashiva
In certain schools of tantra practice,
particularly in the Trika school of
Kashmiri Shaivism, the name for the
first step in the evolutionof the cos-
mos. According to the Trika school, the
Ultimate Reality, conceived as Shiva, is
utterly nondual, and thus neither mas-
culine nor feminine. The first step in
cosmological evolution comes when
the divine consciousness becomes
conscious of itself through the reflec-
tion (vimarsha) of its original illumi-
nation (prakasha). Moved by this self-
consciousness, the unqualified divine
being transforms itself into a divine
being containing a masculine and femi-
nine nature, the first of many such bipolar
dyads from which the universe is born.
The masculine part of this first dyad is
Sadashiva, which is considered theSadashiva