The System of the Vedanta according to Badarayana's Brahma-Sutras and Cankara's Commentary c7.s3.t6.2

c7.s3.t6.2

In the passage from the Chândogya-Upanishad, the beginning of which we translated above, p. 230, it is shown further how all things are triply mixed from the three original elements, fire, water, and food. So, for example, in natural fire, in the sun, moon and lightning, the red comes from the fire-element, the white from the water-element, and the black from the food-element. A preponderance of one of the three elements over the two others, brings about the differences of fire, water, and the other elements, in nature (p. 737, 13; natural fire is trivṛtkṛtaṃ tejas, "the triply formed fire," p. 144, 1, in contradistinction with the atrivṛtkṛtaṃ tejaḥ prathamajam p. 143, 7). The motive for this theory of commingling seems to be the wish to explain how the human body, although it only takes up single materials in nourishment, yet consists of all three original elements, of which the finer portion, like the cream on the milk, rises, while the coarser descends. Thus the body is made up of the three original elements according to the following scheme: