Philosophy and Religion / J. C. Chatterji: Kashmir Shaivism

Jagadish Chandra Chatterji

Kashmir Shaivism

Part II. The Main Doctrines of the System.

B.—The Limited Individual Experience. V-VII. The Means and General Principles of Sensible Experience.

17-13. The five senses, five Powers of Action and five General objects of sense perception.

But Manas is not the only product of Ahankara. Two other classes or groups of factors are also produced from it, viz:

a. The decad of Indriyas or powers, mentioned above, consisting of the quintad of the Powers or capacities of sense perception and the quintad of the powers of action;¹ and

b. The quintad of general objects of the special senses (also mentioned above) or the primary elements of the sense-manifold, i.e., the Tanmatras, as they are technically called in Sanskrit.

Before considering how these are produced from the Ahamkara, let us clearly understand what the first group, i.e. the Indriyas, really are.²

By Indriyas, the Shaiva Philosopher means not merely the physical organs of hearing, feeling-by-touch, seeing, tasting and smelling, and the so-called muscular sense and the bodily organs of action, but also those powers or faculties of the Purusha—rather the Purusha as endowed with and manifesting these faculties and powers—which show themselves as operating through or by these physical organs. While they may therefore be spoken of as 'senses' and organs, we must, in speaking of them thus, bear this distinction carefully in mind.

The Indriyas are divided primarily into two classes which may be spoken of, in reference only to their physical, manifestations but not as they are in themselves, as the sensory and motor nervous systems—in Sanskrit, the Buddhindriyas or Jnanendriyas, the powers of mere perception or the senses; and Karmendriyas, the powers of action.

The former, i.e. the Jnanendriyas or senses proper, are five, namely the Power of:
• hearing
• feeling-by-touch (in which both the temperature and the contact or tactile senses are included. For reasons for this, as well as for the real notion of the Hindu philosophers, who knew this distinction well, in regard to these two senses now recognised by Western psychologists as quite distinct from one another, see Appendix IX).
• seeing
• tasting and
• smelling

The Karmendriyas or Powers of action are also five, namely, the Power of expression such as:
• speaking
• grasping or handling
• locomotion
• excretion (voiding, spitting, expectorating )
• sexual action, (comprising all sexual activity, i.e. all activity which a person of one sex is moved to, or does, perform towards another person of the opposite sex, and which, when so performed, results in overwhelming restfulness and of which the real motive, i.e. moving Force or power, is this desire for this particular kind of restfulness.)

In the physical body these five Powers of action happen (of course for adequate reasons which need not, however, be entered into here) to be represented respectively by the vocal organ, hands, feet, anus (for voiding only ) and the sex organ; but it should be clearly borne in mind that these are not the five powers of action themselves. These physical limbs and organs are no doubt ordinarily the means whereby the operation of the active powers are carried on. Indeed, they have been evolved for the purpose by the Purusha desiring to act in these five ways. But if any of these may happen to be disabled, the power of action, for which it served as an outward means, may still find some other way of accomplishing its task. If, for instance, the feet are disabled, as they may in the case of a cripple, the power of locomotion, which is a superphysical power, may find an outward means in the hands with the help of which a man may be moving about—not so efficiently certainly as with the feet, which have been evolved specially for the purpose through ages of practice, still effectively enough within limits.

Similarly, while the five physical organs of the ear, skin, eye, nose and palate represent and serve as the outward means of operation for, the five senses of perception, the latter are not only not identical with them but are not even absolutely dependent on them. In India it has been always recognized that there are certain ways, known to the Yogins, whereby they can accomplish all that can be done by means of these physical organs without the use of the latter. In the West too, it is not unknown to hypnotists that the hypnotised subject can perceive things—specially can smell and taste—even when no use of the special physical organs ordinarily necessary for the purpose is made.

Now these Powers of the Spirit—five powers of perception differentiated from a general power of mere awareness (i.e. vidya, see Appendix IX) and five of action, i.e. the ten Indriyas—come into manifestation, as said above, from the Ahankara and they do so simultaneously with the Manas. The way they are produced is as follows:—

We have seen that the Manas is the seat of desires, or rather Manas is the Purusha when it has reached that state of manifestation in which it is endowed with or has developed desires. Now these desires are always either to perceive in one or other of the five ways of perception; viz:

• to hear,
• to feel-by-touch (heat or cold, smoothness or roughness and so on ),
• to see,
• to taste, and
• to smell;

or, to act in one or other of the five ways of action viz:

• to express (to speak)
• to handle (to grasp or hold)
• to move about
• to excrete (to void, expectorate and so on) and
• to act being prompted by a sensual impulse with a view to and to remain still when so enjoining what is 'loved' and is felt as one's owm self. (svarupa-vishranti )

In other words desire, as represented by Manas, can never exist by itself. It is desire either to perceive or to act. And therefore the moment there arises such a desire in the Purusha when it has reached the Ahankara Stage, and therewith Manas is produced, that very moment the powers, i.e. the Indriyas, to perceive or to act are also evolved. And as the desire, i.e. Manas, arises, and can arise, only in these ten forms—five for perception and five for action— the ten Indriyas are also produced, simultaneously with the Manas as Desire, in their tenfold forms.

Not only this. The moment the five Indriyas of perception are produced, what are called the five Tanmatras, that is to say, the five primary elements of perception mentioned above, also come into manifestation from the same Ahankara.³ Because the Indriyas can have really no meaning, and really no existence, whatever without the objects with which they are inseparably correlated. The Indriya of hearing has, for instance, no meaning without something to hear,—that is, some sound. Similarly, the Indriya of feeling-by-touch, seeing, tasting and smelling have no meaning without a simultaneous reference to some thing to feel-by-touch, something to see, taste and smell. Therefore the moment the Manas arises as desire, the Ahankara takes a triple form, as for instance,

I desire to-see some-colour.

In this experience the 'I' is the Ahankara in the background; and the three forms of its manifestation are the 'Desire' which is Manas, the Seeing which is the Indriya, (in this case of vision) and the Notion of some colour which is the object of perception. That the Manas as desire and the sense of sight as a power of the Purusha are the modifications of the Ahankara will be readily seen. The object also—the notion of some colour—can be nothing else but only a form of the Ahankara realised as a thing projected outside, as there is no other source from which it can come to the Ahankara, and as it is its own perception: for anything that is any body's own is really a part of his own Self as a person, i.e. of his Ahankara. In later experience such a thing can, in a certain sense, be 'given' from outside first and then woven into the Ahankara and made its own. But at the stage we are now considering there is no such experience possible; and therefore this 'perception' which is the 'own' thing on the part of a particular Ahankara can be evolved only from itself.

Thus it happens that with the manifestation of the five Indriyas of perception there are also evolved, from the Ahankara, the corresponding objects of perception.

But these objects at this stage can be, every one of them, only of a most general character, that is to say, they can be only the general mental conceptions of

• Sound-as-such, as distinguished from particular forms of sound i.e. sounds of various pitch, tone and so on;
• Feel-as-such, as distinguished from the varying forms of it, experienced as cold, warmth and heat, hardness, softness and the like;
• Colour-as-such, as distinguished from particular forms, varieties of shades of colour,—red, green, blue and so on;
• Flavour-as-such,as distinguished from particular forms of flavour,—sweet, bitter, sour and so on; and
• Odour-as-such, as distinguished from particular forms of odour—fragrant, foul and so on;

because, in the first place, there is as yet no reason why there should be a perception, even a mental perception, of any one particular form or shade, rather than another, of any of these sense objects. Such particulars are perceived only when, at a later stage with the experience of a physical world, we have these particulars as the 'given' of the experience, so far as these are supplied by these purely special senses of hearing, feeling-by-touch, seeing, tasting and smelling. And the very fact that we can ever form the general ideas of these sense-objects, i.e. of sound, temperature, colour, flavour and odour as such, as distinguished from the particulars of these, shows that these must already exist somewhere in some part or aspect of our nature as facts of experience; and remaining there serve as a standard, reference to which alone can enable us to talk of the particulars in purely general terms⁴. If the general notions of the particulars of each sense object were not present in our minds, there would be no chance of our forming these from the particulars 'given' by the senses as the physical facts of experience—the particulars being all that we thus get—for that would really mean the very impossible task of building up something which we have never known, the creation of a thing which is totally different in kind from what we have already experienced in some shape or other either in parts or as a whole. And surely we never experience in the physical world, by means of the senses as represented in the body, any such thing as colour in general or colour-as-such, sound-as-such, and so on. These, therefore, must already be experienced in some other state, before the particulars of physical experience can ever be referred to in general terms.

And they are experienced at the stage we are now considering, when they are produced from the Ahankara, as mere general notions of somethings heard, seen and so on, because—and this is the second reason—these general notions of the particulars of the special senses only cannot belong to the generals of the Buddhi, which contains the general ideas not only of these special sense particulars but of all things particular. The general of a special sense is no doubt general in regard to the particulars of that sense only; but it is itself only a particular in regard to what constitutes the contents of the Buddhi—it being but a particular aspect or facet out of a number of aspects which make up a thing, as the latter must necessarily have other aspects as well. The general notion of the 'cow', that is, cow as a species, is not merely the notion of colour-as-such or sound-as-such but a something which possesses both colour-as-such, and sound-as-such, besides many other attributes all no doubt of a general character; for a particular cow is a thing which has particular colours, sound of a particular sort and also other attributes of which each is only a particular form of a general type. The notion of the cow, therefore, as a species, is a general notion in which the generals of colours, sounds and the rest are still further generalised into what has these even as so many particulars.

Thus the general of the particulars of a special sense is only a particular in regard to the general of the Buddhi and is thus different from the latter.

And it is only these generals of the sense-particulars which come into manifestation when the pure 'I am' of the Ahankara experiences itself as a being desiring to hear, to feel-by-touch, to see, taste or smell something, as they alone can be the objects of the perception now desired, they being specialised from the generals of the Buddhi by means of, or through, the intermediate experience of self-realisation, as 'I', that is, as the Ahankara.

And they come into manifestation simultaneously with the Buddhindriyas as the inevitable second term of the indissoluble relation which subsists between the senses and their objects.

These general notions of the particulars, which latter alone are ‘given' by the five special senses as represented in the body, are called the Tanmatras i.e. the general elements of the particulars of sense perception; (lit. That only). These Tanmatras, therefore, are, as said above, the following:
1. Sound-as-such (Shabda-Tanmntra),
2. Feel-as-such (Sparsha-Tanmutra),
3. Colour-as-such (Rupa-Tanmutra),
4. Flavour-as-such (Rasa-Tanmatra), and
5. Odour-as-such (Gandha-Tanmatra).

And as they thus come into manifestation, there are also produced at the same time—from the same Ahankara, but as the results of the reaction of these—the Karmendriyas mentioned above. How they are thus produced may be shown as follows:—

There is a tendency in us that, when we hear someone speak, we often want to respond and speak back. This instinct is seen very strongly preserved in certain lower animals: in jackals, for instance, so that when a jackal hears another cry out, he also instinctively responds and howls back. There are some birds also which possess this instinct in a marked degree; so much so that fowlers in certain parts of India take advantage of it, and find out the whereabouts of such birds by either making a tamed bird of the species utter a cry or by cleverly imitating themselves the cry of the bird. The moment this is done, all birds of the species in the neighborhood begin to respond at once and the fowlers spot them exactly.⁵

Following this tendency, when, with the evolution of the power of hearing, sound-as-such is realised, there is also the realisation, on the part of the spirit (as it now at this stage is i.e. the Purusha with these powers only but still without a body) of the power to respond;— it desires to respond i.e. to speak out in response to the sound heard, and therewith the power to respond that is to express (the Vag-indriya) is evolved.

Then, we find that if anything tickles us or we feel too hot or too cold in any part of the body we instinctively put our hand to that part—there is an instinctive desire to handle that part, rather, to handle what so tickles us or makes us feel thus hot or cold.

Following this instinct, when the Sparsha-tanmatra is realised, i.e. the sensation of Feel-as-such is produced, there arises also the desire to handle what so produced the sensation and therewith the power to handle, i.e., the Hastendriya comes into existence.

Similarly, when we see a thing suddenly bursting into view, there is an instinctive tendency in us to move or run away from, or, as in some cases, towards, it. No doubt it is now greatly checked in us by ages of training and education. But it can be seen strongly present in lower animals. And following this instinct, when, with the evolution of the power of Vision (or Darshanendriya), the colour-as-such or Rupa-Tanmatra is realised, the power to move away from or towards it, i.e., the power of locomotion, the Padendriya, is developed.

Again, when a thing is suddenly put into our mouth the first and instinctive tendency is, not to see how we may like its taste, but to throw it out or eject it. A similar tendency gives rise to the power to discard from our system, which at the stage we are considering is still without a physical body, the moment the sensation of Flavour-as-such is experienced with the evolution of the sense of taste.

Finally, the experience of Odour-as-such gives rise to what is activity really in a negative sense. For it is an act of enjoyment and therefore restfulness, and no movement such as activity generally implies. And it comes about in much the same way as when, with all the other senses closed and inactive (as the situation at the super-physical stage of manifestation we are considering must be regarded to be ) we are made to smell some odour which is more or less of an indifferent character and to which odour-as-such may, to a certain extent, be compared. Such an experience leads neither to an activity of responding as when hearing a sound, nor of handling, locomotion, nor throwing out and rejecting. If anything, it puts one to rest and sleep in a state of passive enjoyment.

Thus corresponding with the five special senses or Jnanendriyas and as their reactions on the Purusha there are produced the five powers or capacities to act, i.e. , the five Karmendriyas, which are:

1. The power to respond by making sounds or speaking—the Vagindriya
2. The power of handling—the Hastendriya
3. The power of moving away from and towards, i.e., of locomotion—the padendriya
4. The power of discarding or throwing out—the payvindriya, and
5. the power of being passively restful and enjoying something by which one is at the same time overcome and prevented from moving, and being united with which one feels as though one has realised one's self—one's very heart's desire and does not want to move out, as when uniting sexually, i.e., embracing or otherwise Upasthendriya.

From Ahankara, then, there really evolves a three-fold production, viz:

1. Manas and the Jnanendriyas. (Mind and senses)
2. The Karmendriyas (Powers of action) and
3. The general objects of the Jnanendriyas i.e. the Tanmatras.

They are however not to be regarded as things existing independently by themselves, but as the endowments of the Purusha which, at this stage, is Ahankara together with, or enveloped in, these, as well as the Ahankara in itself as such, the Buddhi behind it and all the rest, standing, as it were in the far back-ground. The individual as thus endowed may be termed the ' Soul’.

Footnnotes

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