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Obscure Religious Cults as Background of Bengali Literature c23.s1.t3: (C) The Primordial Goddess

Obscure Religious Cults as Background of Bengali Literature c23.s1.t3

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(C) The Primordial Goddess

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The next point to notice is that lord Nirañjana, who personified the creative impulse of the Absolute, desired to create the universe and from the desire emanated the primordial goddess, who is called Ādyā or Ādyā-śakti or Prakṛti or simply the Devī. This also is a very well-known theory absorbing in it many traditions derived from various sources. Already in the Bṛhad-āraṇyakopaniṣat we find that in the beginning was the Ātman and it became self-conscious and from its self-consciousness proceeded ‘Egohood’—(ahaṃ-nāmā’bhavat). It never enjoyed, and as it was not possible to enjoy all alone it longed for a companion; it then divided its own self into two as the male and the female, or as the husband and the wife, and from their union proceeded the creation. In another place of the same text we find that the Ātman was alone in the beginning. Desirous of issues the Ātman wished to have a wife.² These two aspects of the Brahman as the male and the female have been variously

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² Ibid (1.4.17).

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The Primordial Mithuna.

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conceived in the Upaniṣads. Here (in the Bṛhad-āraṇyaka), for instance, the mind is said to be the self (ātmā), speech the wife (vāg jāyā) and life (prāṇa) is the issue. In the Praśno-paniṣat we find that Prajāpati, desirous of progeny, had recourse to penance and produced the couple (mithuna) and the couple consisted of Rayi (matter) and Prāṇa (the vital force),—the Sun is the Prāṇa and the moon is the Rayi¹. In the Bahvṛcopaniṣat (which, however, is undoubtedly a text of much later time) it is said that in the beginning was the Goddess (Devī); she created the egg of the world,—and from her were born the gods like Brahmā, Viṣṇu and Śiva.

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¹ Praśnopaniṣat, (1. 4-5).

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Though, however, the theory of the female counterpart of the original Lord in connection with cosmogony may be traced back even to the days of the Upaniṣads, this idea, as found in the Purāṇic literature as also in the vernacular literature, seems to have been influenced more by popular Sāṃkhya ideas. Notwithstanding the controversies of the philosophers as to the exact nature of Puruṣa and Prakṛti and the exact relation between them, the general view is that the whole creation proceeds from Prakṛti (or the primordial cosmic substance) in contact with Puruṣa, who is the unchanging principle of pure consciousness. Though some schools of Sāṃkhya hold that creation proceeds from the spontaneous disturbance in the equilibrium of the three qualities in Prakṛti, the more general view is that the creative impulse is supplied to Prakṛti by Puruṣa through his contact just as active power is supplied to inactive iron by magnet through its contact (sānnidhya). Through the association or the contact of Puruṣa with Prakṛti the character of the one is infused in the other and the creative process follows as a result of the process of infusion. From this philosophical idea of the association of Puruṣa and Prakṛti and the infusion of the

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Prakṛti of Sāṃkhya.

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character of the one into the other in the process of creation has followed the popular tendency to conceive of Puruṣa as the male and of Prakṛti as the female and of their contact as their union, through which proceeds the visible world. It may be remarked that philosophers also have sometimes taken the analogy of the male and the female in explaining the nature of and the relation between Puruṣa and Prakṛti.

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The cosmic process, however, proceeds from Prakṛti. Prakṛti is constituted by nature of three qualities (guṇa), viz., sattva or the intelligence-stuff, rajas or energy and tamas or inertia. So long as there is the equilibrium of the three guṇas in Prakṛti there is no cosmic process;—the cosmic process follows from the disturbance in the nature of Prakṛti. From the disturbance in Prakṛti first follows the principle of Mahat or Buddhi, which is "the last limit up to which the subjective and the objective can be assimilated as one indistinguishable point which is neither the one nor the other, but which is the sources of them."¹ From Mahat follows the principle of 'egohood' (ahaṅkāra), which in its turn generates the eleven senses on the one hand and the five Tanmātrās (i.e., the five potentials of the five gross elements) on the other. From these five Tanmātrās again follow the five gross elements of earth, water, fire, air and ether. These principles of Puruṣa, Prakṛti, Mahat, Ahaṅkāra, the eleven senses, the five Tanmātrās and the five gross elements taken together constitute the twenty-five Tattvas or principles of Sāṃkhya metaphysics.

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¹ The Study of Patañjali, by Dr. S. N. Das Gupta, p. 51.

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The Gītā, the most popular religio-philosophical literature of India, echoes the Sāṃkhya view of cosmology in a rather popular and synthetic way. There we find the idea of the Absolute (which is known as the Puruṣottama), which approximates the unqualified Brahman of the Vedānta;² but in the active and qualified aspect (i.e., as the Bhagavān) He causes Prakṛti to bear the whole universe.¹ Puruṣa and Prakṛti are frequently called in the Gītā as the Kṣetrajña (literally, the knower of the field) and the Kṣetra (the field), and everything, whatsoever, is created through the union of the Kṣetrajña and the Kṣetra.² Puruṣa and Prakṛti are conceived here just as the original male and the female or the father and the mother.³ This idea of Puruṣa and Prakṛti as the primordial male and the female (or the father and the mother) is to be found in almost all religious systems and literature of India. The same idea of the god and the goddess is to be met with in the Vaiṣṇava literature, in the Śaiva literature and in the Tantras.

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² Vide Gītā, (15. 16-18).

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¹ mayā’dhyakṣeṇa prakṛtiḥ sūyate sacarācaram | hetunā’nena kaunteya jagad viparivartate | Gītā (9.10).

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² yāvat sañjāyate kiñcit sattvaṃ sthāvara-jaṅgamam | kṣetra-kṣetrajña-saṃyogāt tad viddhi bharatarṣabha || Ibid, (13.27)

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³ Cf. mama yonir mahad brahma tasmin garbhaṃ dadhāmyaham | sambhavaḥ sarva-bhūtānāṃ tato bhavati bhārata || sarva-yoniṣu kaunteya mūrtayaḥ sambhavanti yāḥ | tasāṃ brahma mahad-yonir ahaṃ bīja-pradaḥ pitā ||

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In the Purāṇic literature we find but a hotch-potch of the Upaniṣadic and Sāṃkhya ideas with further modification and innovation. Here we generally find a glimpse of the Upaniṣadic idea of the Absolute and then the first manifestation of the Unmanifest in the form of an active personal god with or without the legend of the egg associated with his origin. Then follows Prakṛti from the creative impulse of the Lord as his Śakti (power), and through this introduction of Prakṛti the Sāṃkhya theory becomes interwoven with the ancient legends. The Sāṃkhya theory generally ends with the origination of the gross matter; for the propagation of the human race these Purāṇas generally follow the accounts given in the Manu-saṃhitā. On some of the accounts the Tāntric line of thoughts (which we shall presently discuss) had palpable influence.¹

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¹ For specimens of discussions on cosmogony and cosmology in the Purāṇic and such other popular literatures see Bhāgavata-purāṇa, (3.5. 23-38); Garuḍa-purāṇa (Pūrva-khaṇḍa, Ch. IV); Padma-purāṇa (Sṛṣṭi khaṇḍa, Ch. II); Padma-purāṇa (Kriyā-yoga-sāra, Ch. II); Brahma-vaivarta-purāṇa (Brahma-khaṇḍa, Ch. III); Śiva-purāṇa (Jñāna-saṃhitā, Chs. V and VI); Sanat-kumāra-saṃhitā, Ch. III, Vāyavīya-saṃhitā, Ch. VIII; Khila-harivaṃśa (Ch. I, verses 21 et seq.); Devī-purāṇa, (Ch. AXIX), etc.

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The Sāṃkhya idea of Puruṣa and Prakṛti was inherited by the vernaculars through the medium of the Purāṇas in a more anomalous form. The primordial goddess, originating from the sweat, or the smile of lord Dharma (or Nirañjana, or the Ādi-deva) has frequently been styled as Prakṛti,² and the idea of Prakṛti brought with it the ideas of the guṇas, which were transformed and personified as the triad. We have seen that through the union of lord Nirañjana and the Prakṛti (who is depicted as a very beautiful woman) were produced three sons, Brahmā, Viṣṇu and Śiva of the nature of the three guṇas, viz., sattva, rajas and tamas; and these three sons were then entrusted with the charge of the creation of the world. This, however, represents the general and popular Sāṃkhya view of the contact of Puruṣa with Prakṛti and the creation of the world through the activities of the three qualities of Prakṛti. We have seen that according to the version given in the Dharmāyaṇa of Narasimha Vasu the son born to Prakṛti by Nirañjana was Mahat, and from Mahat originated Ahaṃkāra and the three guṇas. In the version, found in the Caṇḍī-maṅgala of Mukunda-rāma also we find that through the infusion of the energy of the Lord in Prakṛti a son of the name of Mahat was born to them, the son of Mahat was Ahaṃkāra, who again had five sons who represent the five gross elements.

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² It should be noted in this connection that the word Prakṛti in classical Sanskrit literature as well as in the Purāṇic literature became frankly synonymous with the word Śakti or Ādi-devī, the primordial goddess.

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It is to be noted that the primordial goddess had emanated from the Lord. The Lord and the goddess have then been conceived in the vernaculars as the Ādi-deva and the Ādi-devī. Sometimes they have been conceived as the Ādi and the Anādi; the Lord is the beginningless eternal One; while the Goddess, emanating from the body of the Lord, is the produced one. The creation, however, proceeds from the Ādi-devī, and the Ādi-deva returns to his meditation after the goddess has been created. In this theory of the Ādi-deva and the Ādi-devī the vernaculars seem to have been more influenced by the Śaiva and Śākta ideas (as they are found in the Śaiva and Śākta texts and in the Tantras in general) than by the Sāṃkhya theory of Puruṣa and Prakṛti.

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The conceptions of the Ādi-deva and the Ādi-devī of the vernaculars and the conceptions of Śiva and Śakti in the Tantras. We have already pointed out that though in a popular way Puruṣa and Prakṛti of the Sāṃkhya system have somehow been related together in the process of cosmic evolution, metaphysically they are two distinct and self-sufficient realities and it is because of the distinct nature of Puruṣa and Prakṛti that various controversies have arisen as to the exact nature of the relation. In the Tantras and other Śaiva and Śākta literatures the primordial god and the primordial goddess, or Śiva and Śakti, as they are commonly called, are not two distinct ultimate realities; they represent two aspects of the absolute reality and sometimes Śakti is conceived as contained in Śiva as his kinetic energy. The absolute truth is a union of Śiva and Śakti. Śiva represents pure consciousness which is inactive—the static aspect of the ultimate reality;—while Śakti represents the world-force—the dynamic aspect of the ultimate reality; Śiva is *Nivṛtti* (state of rest) and Śakti is *Pravṛtti* (the state of activity) and in the ultimate state they remain in a union of oneness. This is the principle of non-duality (*advaya*) which is explained in the Tāntric texts under the imagery of *maithuna* (conjugal intercourse) or *Kāma-kalā* (as it is called in the texts *Kāma-kalā-vilāsa*, *Devī-upaniṣat* and such other texts).¹ In the *Kāma-kalā-vilāsa* we find that Śiva or Maheśa is pure illumination (*prakāśa-mātra-tanu*) or the abstract self-shining thought with all the principles of activity contracted within it (*antar-līna-vimarśaḥ*); Śakti is the principle of activity or the inherent activity of thought (*vimarśa* or *kriyā-śakti*) and she contains in her the seed of the future worlds (*bhāvi-carācara-bijam*). Śiva, however, realises himself through Śakti, and, therefore, it is said that Śakti is the clear looking-glass in which the form and beauty of Śiva is reflected. The philosophical implication is that pure abstract thought cannot realise its own nature unless it comes back to itself through its own activity, and when thus it returns to itself through *vimarśa*, it becomes ‘egohood’ or *ahaṃkāra*, which is called “the mass produced through the union of Śiva and Śakti” (*śiva-śakti-mithuna-piṇḍa*).² In the gross sense this Śiva is the white-matter (*sita-bindu*) or seed or semen, while Śakti is the red-matter (*śoṇa-bindu*), and I-ness or egohood is the son born to them. This conception of Śiva and Śakti has also been interpreted as matter and energy, which are the two essential component parts of all entity. In everything that exists there must be two things,—that which exists and the power or energy by virtue of which it exists or acts; this matter that exists is the Śiva and the energy of existence is Śakti³ and there is an inseparable relation between them, the one cannot be without the other. Śiva without Śakti is absolutely helpless in doing anything whatsoever,—he himself cannot even vibrate without the help of Śakti.⁴ It is Śakti who creates the

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¹ *Vide* supra, p. 33.

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² *Kāma-kalā-vilāsa* (Kasmir Series of Texts and Studies, No. XII), Verse No. 5.

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³ > *yasya yasya padārthasya yā yā śaktir udiritā |*

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⁴ > *śivaḥ śaktyā yukto yadi bhavati śaktaḥ prabhavitum*

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*sā tu sarveśvarī devī sa tu sarvo maheśvaraḥ ||*
—*Vāmakeśvara-tantra*, (7/31).

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*na ced evam devo na khalu kuśalaḥ spanditum api ||*
—*Ānanda-laharī* or *Saundarya-laharī*, I, ascribed to Śaṅkarācārya.

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universe and preserves it and again destroys it at her own will.¹ It is to be noted that sometimes Śiva has been conceived as the absolute, Śakti with the seed of all manifestation and creation is contained in the very nature of Śiva. Though in many places we find that the one absolute truth divides itself into two aspects as Śiva and Śakti and manifests itself in the world-process and realises itself through it, yet in other places we find that Śiva manifests his power in the form of Śakti only for the purpose of self-realisation,—for, the universal abstract thought-principle cannot realise its ownself without the conscious activities in the form of the world-process.² But whether Śakti be contained in the nature of Śiva, or, Śiva and Śakti be the two aspects of the absolute reality, Śakti is directly responsible for the creation of the visible world—either as the energy (i.e., the world-force), or as the principle of illusion (māyā) as she is known in the popular Vedāntic line of thought. It is because of this that we find in the vernaculars that before the actual cosmological process begins the original goddess comes out of the body of the Lord and herself creates the whole universe. The emanation of the Śakti in the form of a woman from the body of the Lord is to be frequently met with in the Purāṇic and Tāntric texts, and there is no doubt that this idea was received by all the vernacular poets through the Purāṇas and the Tantras. But

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² On the nature of and the relation between Śiva and Śakti see Tantra-tattva (in Bengali) by Śiva-candra Vidyārṇava Bhaṭṭācārya, Part I, the chapter on the philosophy of Śakti (Śakti-tattva) pp. 225 et seq.

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Cf. also

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sā devī paramā devī śivabhinnā śivaṅkarī |
śivabhinnā tayā hīnaḥ śivo'pi hi nirarthakaḥ ||
Sūta-saṃhitā.
paro hi śakti-rahitaḥ śaktaḥ kartum na kiñcana |
śaktas tu parameśānī śaktyā yukto yadā bhavet ||
Vāmakeśvara-tantra. (4-6).
śaktiḥ karoti brahmāṇḍaṃ sā vai pālayate'khilam |
icchayā saṃharatyeṣā jagad etac carā-caram ||
Devī-bhāgavata.

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the oldest basis of the tradition is to be found in the *Ṛg-veda* where it is said that the Father became desirous of meeting his own youthful Daughter and had sex-intercourse with her,¹ Sāyaṇa explains the Father as Prajāpati and the Daughter as Uṣā (Dawn). There is an echo of this fact of the Father meeting the Daughter also in the *Aitareya Brāhmaṇa*,² *Tāṇḍya-mahā-brāhmaṇa*³ and the *Śatapatha-brāhmaṇa*.⁴

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¹ (10.61. 5-7).

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² (3.33).

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³ (8.2.10).

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⁴ (1.6.2.1).

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The three *guṇas* of Prakṛti as conceived in the Sāṃkhya system were ascribed to Śakti in the Tāntric texts, and we frequently find that the triad, *viz.*, Brahmā, Viṣṇu and Śiva, who are put in the charge of creation, preservation and destruction, are the three sons of the original Śakti; and they are of the nature of the three *guṇas*, *viz.*, *sattva*, *rajas* and *tamas*.⁵ In the *Mahā-bhāgavata* we find that in the beginning the universe was without the sun and the moon; there was neither the day nor the night, nor fire nor the directions,—the whole universe was without touch, sight and sound, etc., and it was bereft of all the luminaries. At that time there was only Prakṛti as the supreme reality. When there was the desire for creation in her, she, though formless, assumed the form of a goddess and at once created a personality with the three *guṇas* she had within her; but the person (*Puruṣa*) was without consciousness. She then infused her own creative impulse in that Puruṣa and the Puruṣa thus endowed with power created three personalities of the name of Brahmā, Viṣṇu and Śiva, who were of the nature of the three *guṇas*.⁶ The idea of the Śaktis, emanating from the original Śakti and being united with the triad for the purpose of creation, is also found in these Tantras.¹ In the Śaiva and the Śākta Tantras we find that the original Śakti has three qualities in her, *viz.*, *Icchā* (i.e., the volitional nature), *Jñāna* (i.e., the cognitive nature), and *Kriyā* (i.e., active nature). In the *Gorakṣa-saṃhitā* these *Icchā*, *Jñāna* and *Kriyā* are spoken of as the three goddesses, *viz.*, Gaurī, Brāhmī and Vaiṣṇavī, who are contained in the nature of *Praṇava*.² Again it is said in this connection that with the three component parts of *Praṇava* (i.e., *a*, *u*, and *m*) are associated the three *guṇas* and the triad.³ The triad and the three Śaktis being thus associated with the *Praṇava* could very easily get associated with one another,—and it is for this reason that in the vernacular texts we find the three Śaktis, *viz.*, Gaurī (or Rudrāṇī), Brāhmī (or Brahmāṇī) and Vaiṣṇavī (who represent respectively the three aspects of the original Śakti, *viz.*, *Icchā*, *Jñāna* and *Kriyā*) are generally associated with the triad Śiva, Brahmā and Viṣṇu as their female counterparts. There is also reference to the penance of the triad to propitiate the original Śakti,⁴ and also to the fact that by his austere penances Śambhu could obtain the goddess as his wife;⁵ and we think that these traditions with much poetic innovations, additions and alterations

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⁵ *asmākam śiva-viṣṇośca śaktim ādyām parā-parām |* *viśva-rūpām mahādevīm tvam yajasva sukhāvahām ||* *Devī-purāṇa*, (1.33).

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⁶ *Cf.* also : *brahmādyāḥ puruṣās trayo nija-guṇais tat-svecchayā kalpitāḥ |* *Mahābhāgavata*, quoted in the Tantra-tattva, Part I, p. 235. *tataḥ sā svecchayā svīyai rajaḥ-sattva-tamo-guṇaiḥ |* *sasarja puruṣam sadyaś caitanya-parivarjitam ||* *tam jātam puruṣam vīkṣya sattvā-di-tri-guṇātmakam |* *sisṛkṣām ātmanas tasmin samākrāmayad icchayā ||*

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¹ Cf. *Ibid*, Ch. I. verses 55-56; Ch. II, verse 23.

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² *icchā-jñāna-kriyā śaktir gaurī brāhmī’ti vaiṣṇavī |* *tridhā-śaktiḥ sthitā yata tat-paraṃ jyotir omiti* || *Gorakṣa-saṃhitā*, (5.3).

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³ *Ibid*, (5.4).

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⁴ *yām ārādhya viriñcir asya jagataḥ sraṣṭā hariḥ pālakaḥ |* *saṃhartā giriśaḥ svayaṃ samabhavad dhyeyā ca yā yogibhiḥ* || *Mahā-bhāgavata*, (1.1).

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⁵ *yā svecchayā’sya jagataḥ pravidhāya sṛṣṭim* *samprāpya janma ca tathā patim āpa śambhum |* *ugrais tapobhir api yām samavāpya patnīm* *śambhuḥ padam hṛdi dadhe paripātu sā vaḥ* || *Ibid*, (1.2).

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*tataḥ sa śaktimān sraṣṭā puruṣa-trayaṃ guṇa-trayaḥ |*
*trayo babhūvuḥ puruṣā brahma-viṣṇu-śivāhvayāḥ ||*
*Mahābhāgavata* Ch. I, verses 51-53. (Quoted in the *Tantra-tattva*).

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have found place in the cosmogonical traditions of the vernaculars. The story of the god's or goddess's assuming the form of a corpse to test the triad does not, however, seem to be very old—but as we have seen, the tradition of the penance of the triad seems to have some older basis behind it,—and it seems that the tradition of the penance of the triad with the mixture of popular poetic imagination has obtained its full-fledged form in the story of the test of the triad. In the Bṛhad-dharma-purāṇa,¹ however, we find a detailed account of the story of the test of the triad; but the text has rightly been suspected by scholars to be of much later origin and as such the story might have been borrowed in its full-fledged form from the accounts given in the vernaculars.

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¹ Edited by H. P. Śāstrī, Bibliotheca Indica, New Series, No. 668.

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The story of the test of the triad.

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(iii) Buddhist Element in the Accounts of the Cosmogony and Cosmology of the Vernaculars

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It will appear from what is discussed above that the accounts of cosmogony and cosmology given in the vernaculars are based fundamentally on the Hindu ideas, philosophical, theological, mythological and traditional. Yet we should notice that the later Buddhistic ideas of cosmogony and cosmology have also got mixed up with the Hindu ideas and legends in the accounts given in the vernaculars. But we beg to remind that the popular Buddhistic cosmogonical ideas, found mainly in the Buddhist Tantras and in the Nepalese Buddhistic traditions, are nothing but popular adoption of various Hindu ideas under a Buddhistic garb. In the whole field of Mahāyānic thought we find an inherent tendency of compromise with the Hindu thoughts and ideas,—the ideas of cosmogony and cosmology also seem to have evolved gradually on the Hindu line.

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We have seen that in Vijñāna-vāda Buddhism Śūnyatā was conceived as something like the ultimate substance or the primordial element, from which evolves the visible world. This idea of Śūnyatā, we have said before, was inherited by the later vernacular poets, not as any philosophical concept, but merely as a popular idea floating in the air. It is therefore that we see in the descriptions of the vernaculars that the primordial divinity, who is responsible for the creation of the universe, was himself void by nature. He was moving in the void and the Lord of the void created the universe out of the great void. Again we have seen¹ that the conception of Dharma as described in the vernaculars reminds one at some places of the Mahāyānic conception of the Dharma-kāya of Buddha which is the ‘thatness’ underlying all phenomena. Dharma-kāya is the cosmic oneness from which proceeds the diversity of the cosmic process. In the descriptions of the vernaculars we find that the cosmic process emanates from Dharma. In this idea also some influence of the Mahāyānic conception of Dharma-kāya with all its cosmological implications may plausibly be postulated.

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¹ Vide supra, Ch. XI.

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From the mythological point of view we find it described in the Kāraṇḍa-vyūha that being desirous of creating the universe the original lord (Ādi-buddha) first created the Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara; from the eyes of Avalokiteśvara originated the sun and the moon, Maheśvara from his forehead, Brahmā and others from the two shoulders, Nārāyaṇa from his heart, Sarasvati from the teeth, air from the mouth, the earth from the feet, Varuṇa from his udder; from among all these gods Avalokiteśvara selected Maheśvara, whom he predicted to be the creator in the age of Kali.

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under the name of the Ādi-deva.¹ It is needless to say that mythological accounts of this type have nothing Buddhistic in them in the fundamental nature.

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¹ Kāraṇḍa-vyūha (printed in 1873 in Calcutta by Satyavrata Sāmaśrami in a series of Jaina works), pp. 14-15.

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The Buddhistic influence on the cosmogony and cosmology of the vernaculars is, however, considerably palpable in the conception of the Ādi-deva and the Ādi-devī, with whom the later Buddhistic conceptions of the Ādi-buddha and the Ādi-deva or the Ādi-prajñā or simply Prajñā has got mixed up. We have seen before that this Ādi-buddha and the Ādi-prajñā are nothing but the transformation of the Mahāyānic idea of Śūnyatā and Karuṇā in the image of Prakṛti and Puruṣa or Śakti and Śiva.² To understand the cosmological significance of the conception of the Ādi-deva and the Ādi-devī, we should, therefore, discuss the cosmological significance of Śūnyatā and Karuṇā as it is explained in the Buddhist Tāntric texts.

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² Supra, pp. 29 et seq.

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We have seen that in later Mahāyāna texts, we mean the Buddhist Tantras, Bodhicitta was conceived of as the highest reality of the nature of the ultimate substance from which everything originates. This absolute ultimate substance have two elements in it, *viz.*, Śūnyatā and Karuṇā, or Prajñā and Upāya. Cosmologically Prajñā is pure consciousness and perfect enlightenment, and is the principle of pure passivity; Upāya is the world-force,—it is the dynamic principle, through the activities of which the phenomenal world comes into existence. The metaphysical implication is that Śūnyatā as perfect enlightenment or pure consciousness is purely inactive; it is the principle of universal compassion that disturbs her and causes waves of mentation in that pure consciousness and these waves of mentation are fundamentally responsible for the existence of the phenomenal world. This principle of Upāya as the dynamic force behind the evolution of the world-process is a means, it is held, for leading all sentient beings to the ultimate goal of perfect purification and liberation; and the idea here seems to be akin to the popular Sāṃkhya view that the activities of Prakṛti are finally aimed at the liberation of Puruṣa. It is clear to see, that this cosmological and ontological significance of Prajñā and Upāya are exactly the same as that of Śiva and Śakti, and, as we have already noticed, the only difference is that pure consciousness, which is absolutely passive by nature and represents the negative aspect of the reality, is conceived as the Lord in the Hindu schools, and it is conceived as the goddess in Buddhism; and whereas the active or the positive element is the goddess according to the Hindu view, it is the Lord according to the Buddhist view. But notwithstanding this difference in notion, Prajñā and Upāya have throughout been drawn in the image of Śiva and Śakti. As in the Hindu Tantras Śiva and Śakti are conceived of sometimes as constituting the two aspects of one absolute reality,--but sometimes again Śiva is in many places depicted as the absolute reality, Śakti being included in his nature;—so also is the case with Prajñā and Upāya,—sometimes they are explained as two aspects of the one reality, and sometimes, Prajñā being the absolute reality, Upāya is said to be included in her nature. But in either case the relation between the two is inseparable as is in the case of Śiva and Śakti.

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These conceptions of Prajñā and Upāya have important ontological and cosmological bearing on the four schools of Nepalese Buddhism.¹ The Svābhāvika school holds that there is no immaterial ultimate truth in the form of the soul substance; matter is the primordial substance, from which the world proceeds. This matter as the ultimate substance Prajñā and Upāya in Nepalese Buddhism.

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¹ The four schools are:—(i) Svābhāvika, (ii) Aiśvarika, (iii) Karmika and (iv) Yātnika.

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has two modes which are called Pravṛtti and Nivṛtti, action and rest, dynamic and static, concrete and abstract. Matter is eternal as a crude mass (however infinitely attenuated in Nivṛtti) and so are the powers of matter. The proper state of existence of these powers is the state of Nivṛtti or rest as the abstraction from all phenomena. When these powers pass from the state of rest into their causal and transitory state of activity the phenomenal world comes into existence, and it again ceases to exist when the powers repass from Pravṛtti to Nivṛtti. This Nivṛtti is the Prajñā¹ and Pravṛtti is the Upāya. We have seen that Prajñā and Upāya are deified as the Ādi-prajñā and the Ādi-buddha, and the visible world is said to be created through their union. Buddha as the principle of active power first proceeds from Nivṛtti or Ādi-prajñā and then associates with her and from their union proceeds the actual visible world. The principle is symbolised as Prajñā being first the mother and then the wife of the Buddha. The well-known triad—Buddha, Dharma and Saṅgha—has often been explained, as we have seen, as Upāya (Buddha), Prajñā (Dharma) and the world (Saṅgha) produced through the union. In some of the Nepalese schools of Buddhism Prajñā as Dharma is given the highest prominence in the scheme of the triad and Buddha emanates from Prajñā. In some of the Hindu Tantras also we find that the goddess has been given more prominence than the Lord, the former being conceived as the first principle. In some places, it has been pointed out, the primordial Lord is seen floating in water. What is this water? It is, according to some of the Tantras, Śakti, who is pervading the whole universe in the form of water. This belief influenced the Nepalese Buddhists also, who have often conceived of Ādiprajñā in the form of primordial water.¹ This Ādi-buddha and Ādi-prajñā or Ādi-devī are the original father and mother of the world.² In the *Svayambhu-purāṇa* Prajñā is described as the Śakti of Śiva, as the mother of the three worlds, the void of the voids—the mother of the Buddhas,—the mother of all the gods.³ Again, all female creatures are said to be the incarnations of Prajñā while all males are the incarnations of Buddha (*Upāya*). Again the Lord symbolises the generative power while the lady symbolises the productive power. The Lord is the seed (*bindu*) and the lady is the ovum (*rajas*),—and from their union proceeds the Bodhicitta, from which everything is born. The Ādi-prajñā or the Ādi-śakti is also spoken of as of the triangular form (*tri-koṇākāra*, which is the symbol of the productive power) as she is described in the Hindu Tantras also.

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¹ Vide Illustrations of the Literature, etc., by Hodgson, p. 149.

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¹ *Cf. prajñā jalamayā-kārā | prajñā strī-liṅgatvāt drava-rūpā tato jalā-kārā || Dharma-koṣa-saṃgraha*, MS. p. 5 (B).

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² *Devendra-paripṛcchā-tantra*, quoted in the *Subhāṣita-saṃgraha*, p. 76 (MS). It is interesting to note how Prajñā and Upāya have sometimes been saluted as the mother and the father of the world just in the manner and even in the language in which poet Kālidāsa has saluted Pārvatī and Maheśvara in the first verse of the first canto of the *Raghu-vaṃśa*.

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³ *Svayambhu-purāṇa*, edited by H. P. Śāstrī (Bibliotheca Indica), pp. 179-180.

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From the above it will be clear that, in the conception of the Ādi-deva and the Ādi-devī of the vernaculars (or of the Ādi and the Anādi as we find in the Nāth literature), we find a popular mixture of Puruṣa and Prakṛti of the Sāṃkhya system, of Śiva and Śakti as we find in Tāntricism in general, and the Ādi-buddha and the Ādi-prajñā of the different schools of later Buddhism. It may cursorily be noticed that in the Taoism of China we find a similar conception of cosmogony, where it is held that the universe proceeds from the primordial parents Tao and Tai or rather from the original male and the female, *yang* and *yin*.

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*vāgarthāviva saṃpṛktau jyotsnā-candramasāviva |*
*jagatāṃ pitarāvādyau prajño-pāyāv-upāsmahe ||*
*Dharma-koṣa-saṃgraha*, MS. p. 10 (B).

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(iv) Similarity of the Descriptions of the Vernaculars with those of other Literatures.

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The cosmogonical and cosmological descriptions found in other parts of the world offer points of similarity with the descriptions given above. The *Voluspa*, which supplies us with cosmogonic account of the Scandinavian branch of the Teutons, begins as follows:—

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“There was, in times of old, where Ymir dwelt,
nor land nor sea, nor gelid waves;
earth existed not, nor heaven above;
there was a chaotic chasm,
and verdure nowhere.”¹

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¹ Hasting's *Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics*. (The article on Cosmogony and Cosmology.)

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Some Babylonian descriptions also begin in a similar manner; thus:—

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“When above unnamed was the heaven,
(And) earth below by a name was uncalled,
Apsu (the deep) in the beginning (ristu) being their together,
(And) the flood (Mammu) of Tiamat the mother of them all,
Their waters were embosomed together (in one place),
But no reed had been harvested, no marsh-plant seen;
At that time the gods had not appeared, any one (of them)
By no name were they called, no destiny (was fixed).”²

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² *Ibid*, p. 129. *Cf.* also:— “No holy house, no house of the gods in a holy place has yet been built, No reed had grown, no tree been planted, No bricks been made, no brick-mould formed, No house been built, no city founded, No city built, no man (adam) made to stand upright, The deep was uncreated, Eridu unbuilt, The seat of its holy house, the house of the gods, uncreated, All the earth was sea, While within the sea was a current.” etc. *Ibid.*, p. 129.

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The belief that water was the primordial element is found in many countries. Thus according to the Babylonians “the primal element of the universe was water, symbolised and ruled by Tiamat, the personification of ‘Chaos,’ until she was slain by the god Marduk.” This conception of the cosmic ocean is found in some Greek and Egyptian accounts also. The tradition of the well-known cosmic-egg is also found in other countries; thus ‘at Eliphantine (of Egypt) it was believed that Khnum had made the cosmic egg from the mud of the Nile.’¹

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¹ Hasting's Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics, p. 126.

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