The Samkhya System: A History of the Samkhya Philosophy c12.21

c12.21

It is characteristic of the Sāmkhya that it does not restrict, like the Vedānta, the saving knowledge to the three upper classes of the Aryan community to the exclusion of the Śūdras. This generosity of outlook is seen already in the great epic (xiv, 19, 61), where the result of Yoga is distinctly declared to be open even to women and to Śūdras, and the same sentiment can doubtless legitimately be recognized in the fact that the system, despite its fondness for sub-divisions, actually classes in its theory of the kinds of living creatures men in one division only, while divine beings fall under no less than eight. The motive for the difference of treatment doubtless lies in the fact that the Sāmkhya, like the Yoga, does not build on the Veda as an exclusive foundation, and therefore, unlike the Vedānta, they do not fall under the rule which excludes Śūdras from even hearing the Veda recited. The fact that the Veda formed one of the sources of proof of the system was not any more inconsistent with the system being made available to all, than the fact that the epic which contains Vedic quotations was equally open to Śūdras to hear.