Indian Philosophy v2.c24.s23.2

v2.c24.s23.2

THE Sāṃkhya system represents a notable departure in thought from what may be called the formalistic habit of mind. By its emphasis on the principle of continuity, it marks, in some degree, the abandonment of the tendency to view the universe as tied up in neat parcels. Its rejection of the rigid categories of the Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika as inadequate instruments for describing the complex and fluid universe, makes it a real advance on the theory of atomistic pluralism. It undermines the foundations of supernatural religion by substituting evolution for creation The world is not the act of a creator God, who summoned up by a single fiat of his will a world entirely distinct from himself, but is the product of the interaction between the infinite number of spirits and the ever-active prakṛti, or the potentiality of nature—what Plato calls "the receptacle and nurse of all generation."¹