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Goodness of Sanskrit
Studies in Honour of
Professor Ashok N. Aklujkar
Edited by
Chikafumi Watanabe
Michele Desmarais
Yoshichika Honda
D. K. Printworld
New Delhi, India
January 2012
Observations on yogipratyakṣa
Raffaele Torella
1A seemingly marginal topic in the immense panorama of the philosophies of
India is the ‘perception of the yogi’ (yogipratyakṣa, yogijñāna), the special pow-
er of insight and visualisation that most of the Indian traditions attribute to the
yogis. The term ‘yogi’ here does not designate someone who has just happened
to devote himself to the ancient practices of this discipline, but rather a being
that, though being ‘human,’ is perceived as being (or having become) intrinsi-
cally different from the generality of men. Indian philosophers, including the
loftiest ones, call them asmadviśiṣṭa ‘different from [superior to] us.’ The exis-
tence of such powers in yogis is taken for granted. Not only is the need to prove
them not felt, but they are considered so firmly rooted in common sense (loka-
prasiddha) as to be confidently used for exemplification, that is, to confirm the
existence of other phenomena deemed to be problematic or somehow in need of
demonstration.2 This article does not aim at an exhaustive treatment of this topic,
but only presents some of the guidelines of a research in progress, which will,
hopefully in a not too distant future, take the shape of a monograph.
As a provisional starting point, we could take the third section of the Yoga-
sūtra, dealing with supernatural powers (vibhūti), particularly sūtras 16–55.
From the sustained practice of yoga, a radical enhancement of the normal pow-
ers of perception derives, which enables the yogi to see distant objects or objects
of very minute dimensions, including the atoms, to understand the voices of all
living beings, to know the past and the future, to penetrate other minds, to know
what happened in his and others’ previous lives, to foresee the moment of death,
to obtain superhuman strength, to know the position of stars and sidereal spaces,
to eliminate the need for food, and so on. The fact that these beliefs were not re-
stricted to the circles specifically involved in the theory and practice of yoga is
shown by the hints, brief but nonetheless quite explicit, that we can find in other
1 I am very grateful to David Mellins for kindly improving my English, and for his helpful
comments.
2 See e.g. Utpaladeva resorting to the example of the magic creation of the yogi to account
for Śiva creating the universe without a material cause (Īśvarapratyabhijñākārikā, I.5.7,
II.4.10; cf. Torella 2002: 116, 179).
From “Saṁskṛta-sādhutā: Goodness of Sanskrit. Studies in Honour of Professor Ashok N. Aklujkar. Edited by ChikafumiWatanabe, Michele Desmarais, and Yoshichika Honda. Published by D. K. Printworld, New Delhi, India, 2012.”
ancient texts, such as those of Vaiśeṣika and Nyāya.3 Vaiśeṣika, a school that for
sure cannot be suspected to indulge in the mystic or irrational, refers to the per-
ception of the yogi in its very root-sūtra (IX.13–17, according to Candrānanda).4
These sūtras are implicitly referred to in a passage of Praśastapāda’s
Padārthadharmasaṁgraha (Biardeau 1964: 120, Isaacson 1993: 146–147), which
adds some interesting elements to the overall picture:
But for yogis, who are superior to us, when [in the condition called]
yukta,5 an unerring seeing of the object’s own nature arises, by virtue
of [their] internal organ [which] is assisted by dharma arising from
yoga, in regard to [the following substances:] their own ātman and
[the ātman of] others, ether, space, time, atoms, air and the internal
organ, [as well as] in regard to the qualities, actions, universals and
ultimate individuators which are inherent in these [substances], and
in regard to [the category] inherence. Furthermore, for [yogis in the
condition called] viyukta, perceptual knowledge arises in regard to
objects which are fine (sūkṣma), concealed [from sight], or at a
[great] distance […] (Padārthadharmasaṁgraha, pp. 464–465; transl.
Isaacson 1993: 146–147).
Later on, Praśastapāda returns to the subject, and elaborates on it. In fact, there
are also other types of ‘seers,’ first and foremost the vedic ṛṣis, who are under-
stood to have ‘seen’ the vedic hymns, to have authored the root-sūtras of various
branches of learning, and to be the ultimate authorities on language. These semi-
divine beings belong to an irretrievable past, and their ontological distance from
us cannot be filled, even more than the distance that divides us from another
‘different,’ precisely the yogi.6 But with some exceptions…
In the ṛṣis, the creators of tradition [Śrīdhara glosses: ‘the authors of the
Veda,’] by virtue of a conjunction between the internal organ (manas)
3 Pakṣilasvāmin Vātsyāyana (around 500 CE) in his Bhāṣya on Nyāyasūtra I.3 (p. 9) refers to
pratyakṣaṁ yuñjanasya yogasamādhijam, quoting Vaiśeṣikasūtra IX.13.
4 Wezler (1982: 664–669) tentatively states that the date of the insertion of these sūtras in
the body of the Vaiśeṣikasūtra is relatively recent (post-Praśastapāda?).
5 yukta is said of the yogi in the state of perfect absorption (samādhi); the yogi is termed
viyukta, when he has come out of samādhi.
6 However, when later speculation on this subject more and more shifts to its epistemolo-
gical implications, yogijñāna and ṛṣijñāna will tend to be taken as mere synonyms.
471Torella
and the self,7 and of a special merit, an intuitive cognition (prātibha)
arises, which furnishes an infallible vision regarding objects which ex-
ceed sensorial faculties and belong to the past, the future or the
present—such as dharma—, and which may, or may not, figure in re-
vealed texts. This form of cognition is, primarily, widespread among
the divine seers, but sometimes it may also occur among ordinary beings,
as when a little girl says: “Tomorrow, my brother will come, it is my
heart to say so.” Then, there is the cognition of the ‘perfects’ (siddha),
which however is not basically different from the latter8 (ibid., pp. 627–
629).
The terms yogipratyakṣa (or yogijñāna), ṛṣijñāna, siddhajñāna and pratibhā,9
though arising in contexts that are (at least partially) distinct, end up being taken
as synonymous terms by medieval traditions, united by a common potential: the
possibility for the individual to have a different kind of cognition from the ordi-
nary. According to Nyāya (but also to many other schools that tacitly accept the
Nyāya way to account for ordinary reality), normal cognition is characterised by
the interaction of six factors, which mutually condition each other through their
7 That is, by ‘jumping’ the other factors that come into play in the ordinary cognitive process,
established by the Vaiśeṣikasūtra (V.2.12, IX.15) in the number of four (ātman, indriya,
manas, artha; in ordinary perception they can be reduced to three or two, according to the
specific nature of the object perceived (Padārthadharmasaṁgraha pp. 459–464; cf.
Lyssenko 1998: 88–89). See also Nyāyasūtra I.9.
8 According to Praśastapāda, the main difference between ṛṣijnāna and siddhajñāna lies in
the fact that the former is spontaneous, while the latter depends on a special effort and is
the result of a process of ‘perfection,’ which involves the use of unguents and other magi-
cal substances (cf. Lyssenko 1998: 101–102). On the ‘cognition of siddhas,’ see also
Yogasūtra III.32.
9 To these we can add prajñā (particularly in the Buddhist context); according to Jayaratha
(ad Tantrāloka I.2, vol. I, p. 17), prajñā is equivalent to pratibhā. Bhartṛhari links explic-
itly pratibhā to yoga: in fact, yoga is listed among the six possible causes of pratibhā
(Vākyapadīya II.152). As an example of this kind of pratibhā, the Vṛtti mentions pre-
cisely one of the most characteristic powers of the yogi: penetrating the minds of others (p.
222 parābhiprāyajñānādiṣu). According to Vākyapadīya I.37–38, some particular beings
(the Vṛtti simply says: śiṣṭāḥ), with their ‘divine’ eyes (ārṣeṇa cākṣuṣā), can perceive what
exceeds the range of ordinary senses; what they say cannot be invalidated by inference. In
these beings, in whom light has become manifest and mind is not defiled, the knowledge
of the past and future arises, and this knowledge does not differ from perception.
472 Observations on yogipratyakṣa
interaction: self, body, senses, sense objects, the mind, internal sense (Nyāya-
sūtra I.9); as we have seen (fn. 7), in the classical Vaiśeṣika doctrine these fac-
tors are reduced to four.
At this point, we can already figure out the possible primary reason why,
from inside the brahmanical tradition, staunch opponents of any form of yogi-
pratyakṣa have risen, as discordant voices in an essentially unison choir. In de-
nying even the theoretic possibility of a special perception by the yogi, the
Mīmāṁsakas are not so much driven by their strong realistic stance, which keeps
them distant from any mystical or esoterical practice, but, rather, by the episte-
mological consequences of such a privileged power of cognition.10 To admit that
man, either due to a natural gift or a specific psychophysical training, is given
access to what exceeds the range of senses (or, we can add, of human reason),
poses a threat to atīndriya par excellence, dharma, whose radical otherness
requires foundation on a non-human authority: vedic revelation. For this,
Mīmāṁsā has established itself as the exclusive interpreter and guardian. Sig-
nificantly, the Mīmāṁsakas’ anti-yogi polemics flares up in precisely at the time
that Buddhist tradition introduces yogipratyakṣa. Unsurprisingly, this does not
occur within mystico-religious schools, but precisely within logico-epistemol-
ogical ones.
It is in fact Dignāga who is the first to consider yogic perception as one of
the recognised varieties of the primary means of knowledge, perception (praty-
akṣa), side by side with sensorial perception, ‘mental’ (mānasa) perception and
the introspective awareness (svasaṁvitti) that every mental event has of itself. In
Pramāṇasamuccaya I.6cd, he defines yogic perception as “the vision of the
object as it is in itself (arthamātra°), unmixed with the teaching of the mas-
ters.”11 Dignāga’s qualification “as it is in itself” (°mātra°) is explained by
10 The considerations of the Mīmāṁsakas—in the words of their main exponent, Kumārila
(Ślokavārttika, Codanā 134–136; cf. McCrea forthcoming)—concern primarily the possi-
bility of verification: if yogipratyakṣa is taken in the highest sense of perception of what is
intrinsically beyond the cognitive power of ordinary man, or as synonymous with ‘omni-
science,’ then it escapes verification (unless by another omniscient). If, instead, it is
understood as the perception of an object that is outside the range of normal perception
only occasionally and provisionally, then it is indeed verifiable but also basically futile.
11 Pramāṇasamuccaya I.5cd yogināṁ gurunirdeśāvyatibhinnārthamātradṛk, to which the
svavṛtti has very little to add: yoginām apy āgamavikalpāvyavakīrṇam arthamātra-
darśanaṁ pratyakṣam. Therefore, ‘the teaching of the masters’, according to Dignāga, is
to be understood as ‘the conceptualisations deriving from [or ‘the various alternatives pro-
vided by] the revealed tradition.’ Cf. the occurrence of this unusual compound in Vākya-
473Torella
Jinendrabuddhi, as meaning “with the exclusion of any erroneous superim-
position.”12 This concept, as introduced by Dignāga, is taken up and developed
by Dharmakīrti, who in the Nyāyabindu describes the yogic perception as that
‘which arises at the end of the progressive intensification of the meditation
(bhāvanā) on a real object’ (I.11 bhūtārthabhāvanāprakarṣaparyantajaṁ yogi-
jñānaṁ ceti).13 From Dharmakīrti’s Pramāṇavārttika (PV) III.281–286 and
Pramāṇaviniścaya I, pp. 27–29, vv. I.28–32, we learn that what makes this cog-
nitive experience unique is its identification with ‘meditation, visualisation, in-
ner cultivation’—conceptual and projective processes, which however attain
such a vividness and clarity (sphuṭa, spaṣṭa) that they become indistinguishable
from sensorial perception proper.14 In fact, the laconic definition by Dignāga
and the very few passages that Dharmakīrti devotes to this theme strike us for an
undeniable difference in emphasis: while the former mentions yogipratyakṣa
only at the moment of the presentation of the pramāṇas, the latter seems to insert
it in a context that is essentially soteriological (cf. Eltschinger forthcoming).
Furthermore, Dignāga’s requirement that yogipratyakṣa be ‘unmixed with the
teaching of the masters’ does not seem to figure in Dharmakīrti’s conception,
which admits that bhāvanā may encompass this in its process, since a ‘correct’
bhāvanā may be applied only to an object sanctioned by the teaching of the
Buddha—or even provided by him, such as the Four Noble Truths. The two lev-
els of understanding have been unified only by the post-Dharmakīrti authors. It
is not without a certain uneasiness that we see Jinendrabuddhi continue his con-
cise comments on Dignāga’s ‘epistemological’ treatment by shifting abruptly to
the meditative-soteriological orientation that will be later adopted by Dharma-
padīya II.233cd anāgamavikalpā tu svayaṁ vidyopavartate. After all, also ordinary praty-
akṣa could share this definition; the difference, if I understand it correctly, is that yogi-
pratyakṣa does not depend on sensorial faculties (Viśālāmalavatī p. 57 yathā mānasam avi-
kalpakam pratyakṣam, tathā yoginām api; Pramāṇasamuccayasvavṛtti p. 3 […] indriyān-
apekṣatvān mānasaṁ […].
12 Viśālāmalavatī, pp. 56–57 mātraśabdo ’dhyāropitārthavyavacchedārthaḥ.
13 On the many problematic aspects of this definition see below.
14 This point is the object of strong criticism by all brahmanical opponents (see below). It is
very interesting to contrast what Dharmakīrti and Utpaladeva (cf. Torella 2007: 546–548,
556–561) understand by sphuṭatva in a very similar context, and to see the different, if not
opposite, ways they propose to realise it.
474 Observations on yogipratyakṣa
kīrti.15 Lastly, to further complicate the matter, there is the fact that it is not al-
together clear (at least, to me) who precisely are the Buddhist referents of
Kumārila’s critique, which does not seem to be addressed to the positions of
Dignāga and Dharmakīrti alone.
The Buddhist concept of yogipratyakṣa thus evolves apart from mere super-
natural powers,16 which are the culmination and the prize of the career of a pro-
ficient yogi, as the admission of the yogic cognition is more and more tightly
bound to the concept of ‘omniscience,’ proper to the Buddha, and the basis of
the truth of his teaching, which cannot (nor does it want to) claim extrahuman
authority. Moreover, the concept of omniscience is itself problematic in that it
oscillates between an omniscience that we could define as quantitative and ana-
lytic, and another seen to be qualitative and synthetic. While the former (sarva-
sarvajñatva)17 refers to a knowledge of the immense heap of objects that form
the universe, the latter (sarvajñatva, upayuktasarvajñatva), being oriented to the
path of liberation (by far preferred by the Buddhists and finding a parallel in
Upaniṣadic notions of the term) can conceivably consist in the knowledge of a
single thing (cf. McClintock 2000) through which the great truths of Buddhism
(impermanence, the non-existence of the self, etc.) can be derived. This theme,
which becomes popular in later speculation, beginning with that of Jñānaśrīmitra,
had already been introduced by Dharmakīrti (PV II.30–31): “He who knows the
true reality of what has to be abandoned or appropriated, along with the means to
realise this [abandon and appropriation]: he alone is to be considered a valid
means of knowledge, and not at all he who knows everything. Therefore, we
should be concerned only by his knowledge regarding what has to be practised,
while his knowing the number of all insects is of no use to us.” It is precisely
15 However, Dharmakīrti, though undoubtedly focusing on the meditative aspect, appears
well aware that other dimensions are also present in yogipratyakṣa; see his remarks on the
yogi’s penetration of other minds in PV III.453–457, examined in Franco forthcoming.
16 In the Buddhist circles such powers (ṛddhi, abhijñā) are confined to a well defined di-
mension and acknowledged as partly common also to non-Buddhist traditions (cf. Jaini
1974: 81, Eltschinger 1997: 83). Dharmakīrti’s irony on this matter (PV II.33) is quite
telling: “Let us admit that one may have the power of seeing at great distance (dūraṁ
paśyatu), or that he does not have such a power, but he should see instead the truth that we
require [for our liberation] (tattvam iṣṭaṁ tu paśyatu)! If one endowed with the power of
seeing at great distance should be a means of knowledge [of the truth], then we should
worship the vultures…”
17 This is, for instance, the kind of omniscience that Jainism attributes to its founder (Jaini
1974: 70–75).
475Torella
with the quotation of PV II.30 that Ratnakīrti sets out the treatment of upayukta-
sarvajña ‘he who knows everything is [soteriologically] useful’ in the Sarvajña-
siddhi (p. 1).18 It does not seem inappropriate to somehow link sarvasarvajña-
tva with the knowledge of ‘real things’ (vastu), and upayuktasarvajñatva with the
knowledge of their properties (vastudharma, like impermanence, etc.); see below
fn. 33. Pakṣilasvāmin Vātsyāyana had already formulated a similar concept.
According to the Bhāṣya on Nyāyasūtra I.1.1, (°prameya° tattvajñānān niḥ-
śreyasādhigamaḥ ‘From the true knowledge of […] the objects of valid cog-
nition […] there is an attainment of the supreme good’), prameya does not refer
to any object of valid cognition but only to the objects whose correct knowledge
leads to liberation. In this context, the Nyāyabhāṣya mentions the four artha-
padas ‘significant statements?,’19 which correspond to ‘what has to be eliminated’
(heyam), ‘the cause of what has to be eliminated’ (tasya nirvartakam), ‘absolute
elimination’ (hānam ātyantikam) and ‘means to elimination’ (tasyopāyaḥ), and
thus are basically homologous to the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism.
The general impression one gathers from the lines just sketched is that Bud-
dhist philosophers care less for the yogic dimension proper and the various pow-
ers to be derived from this, their interest rather focusing on the epistemological
and meditative implications of the yogipratyakṣa. The same approach is fol-
lowed also by their opponents par excellence, the Mīmāṁsakas, who seem to
have no more than a benevolent indifference towards the mirabilia of the yogi,
provided that he limits himself to ‘playing’ with them.
For their part, in addressing the issue of yogipratyakṣa the Buddhists seem
driven by two different yet concentric aims: on the one hand, to admit in the in-
dividual the capacity of seeking for truth by his forces alone, independently from
the support of any revelation, and, on the other, to protect the central tenets of
Buddhism from brahmanical critics, who, through sophisticated dialectics, are
capable of questioning any truth obtained by way of reasoning. The latter of
these might be the motif of the entrance of yogipratyakṣa into the epistemol-
ogical and apologetic agenda of Dignāga and his followers: to save the Four
Noble Truths from the scathing criticism of the brahmanical philosophers by
presenting them as warranted by the means of knowledge widely admitted to be
the most reliable, the direct perception, though by a non-ordinary person, such as
the yogi and, prior to him, the Buddha—whence the attacks, primarily of the
18 On the omniscience in the sense of upayuktasarvajñatva, see Steinkellner 1978: 125,
Moriyama forthcoming.
19 Here the two lemmas of the compound padārtha, generally translated as ‘category,
thing,’ are purposely inverted.
476 Observations on yogipratyakṣa
Mīmāṁsakas, against all claim of direct confrontation with matters of nonhuman
experience and, more generally, to omniscience (by the Buddha and Mahāvīra).
Such criticism was less severe in Nyāya and Vaiśeṣika, which, being less direct-
ly concerned than the Mīmāṁsā with protecting vedic revelation, limit them-
selves to denying the omniscience alone, and admit yogipratyakṣa, provided that
it does not become too ambitious.20 The post-dharmakīrtian speculation, particu-
larly with Jñānaśrīmitra and Ratnakīrti,21 perseveres in the analysis of yogi-
pratyakṣa, but its main concern is the defence of the Buddha’s omniscience
against the refutations of Mīmāṁsakas and Naiyāyikas.
Thus, from a relatively marginal theme in the cursus of the yoga adepts, the
issue of yogipratyakṣa opens to a far wider dimension, absolutely crucial for
Indian philosophy as a whole: the question of whether a seeker of truth may do
without revealed tradition. Revelation becomes necessary when truth is shown
to be beyond the reach of human knowledge. But, in the face of this requisite,
India has allowed, or at least not excluded, an alternative solution: a special
power of direct penetration which evades the perilous channels of direct percep-
tion (however prestigious it may be), inference and other indirect means of
knowledge. In the vedic sphere, two powers—which are sometimes distinct
from each other, sometimes intertwined or partially coincident—fall into this
category: dhī ‘mental vision, visualisation’ and pratibhā ‘direct intuitive pene-
tration.’22 The latter has a longer and more articulated life,23 while the former
remains restricted to vedic domain or becomes, in non-technical usage, synony-
20 One can even surmise that Vaiśeṣika antedates Buddhism in warranting what cannot be
demonstrated—or, at least, cannot be ‘seen’ (atīndriya)—through yogipratyakṣa, when it
allows the yogi the capacity to ‘see’ the inherence, the atoms and so on (see the passage of
Praśastapāda quoted above), and even the antyaviśeṣa of the various atoms and liberated
souls (Lyssenko 1998: 105–110). Cf. Wezler 1982: 669, Lyssenko 1998: 112–114.
21 The Sarvajñasiddhi of Ratnakīrti (Bühnemann 1980) closely follows the two works that
his master Jñānaśrīmitra devoted to this theme, the Yoginirṇayaprakaraṇa and the Sarva-
jñasiddhi (Steinkellner 1977, 1978). The issue of the Buddha’s omniscience is already
present in the Tattvasaṁgraha and the Pañjikā thereon (McClintock 2000).
22 For dhī, I refer to the famous monograph that Gonda devoted to this term, having so indef-
inite contours (Gonda 1963); on pratibhā, see Gonda 1963: 318–348, Kaviraj 1990, Tola
1990.
23 Pratibhā is also the gift that Sarasvatī bestows to her children, the poets (Granoff 1995).
On the role of pratibhā in artistic creation and aesthetic speculation—extraordinarily
interesting but too vast and complex to be even cursorily touched on here—see recently
Shulman 2008.
477Torella
mous with ‘knowledge’ in its most general sense.24 A special prestige is as-
cribed to pratibhā in advaita Śaivism of Kashmir. When in the Tantrāloka (TĀ)
Abhinavagupta proceeds to a classification of masters, it is the ‘intuitive’ master
that is given the highest rank: his intuitive knowledge (prātibhaṁ jñānam), also
known as the ‘great’ knowledge (mahājñānam), does not depend either on the
scriptures or other masters; to him all the other masters have to pay homage.25
Thus, pratibhā—like yogipratyakṣa for the Buddhists—is placed at the summit
of spiritual experience by the śaivādvaitins. Buddhism often describes the spiri-
tual progress as consisting of three levels: śruta ‘the teaching derived from au-
thoritative texts,’ cintā ‘intellectual reflection’ and, lastly, bhāvanā ‘meditative
realisation or spiritual cultivation.’26 Yogipratyakṣa is connected with the latter
24 In common usage, pratibhā (or prātibhajñāna) often becomes interchangeable with yogi-
jñāna/yogipratyakṣa. Cf. e.g. Jayaratha ad TĀ XVI. 242 (vol. X, p. 95): yoginām prāti-
bhajñānādav atīndriyārthaviṣayaṁ jñānam.
25 “The master in whom the correct reasoning [sattarka; as a technical term, it is the highest
aṅga of śaiva yoga] has manifested holds authority on everything, is a ‘consecrated one’
(abhiṣikta), being initiated by the goddesses of his own consciousness (svasaṁvittidevī).
Among all the masters he is rightly said to be the principal. In his presence, the other
masters—the ‘constructed ones’ (kalpita)—have no authority.” (TĀ IV.42b–44a; transl.
based on Gnoli 1999: 87).
26 Pramāṇaviniścaya I p. 27 yoginām api śrutamayena jñānenārthān gṛhītvā yukti-
cintāmayena vyavasthāpya bhāvayatāṁ tanniṣpattau yat spaṣṭāvabhāsi […]. Cf. the first
Bhāvanākrama of Kamalaśīla (p. 514 tatra prathamaṁ tāvat śrutamayī prajñotpādanīyā/
tayā hi tāvad āgamārtham avadhārayati/ tataś cintāmayyā prajñayā nītaneyārthaṁ nir-
vedhayati/ tatas tayā niścitya bhūtam arthaṁ bhāvayen nābhūtam). Śruta, cintā and
bhāvanā mark three levels of prajñā. Such progression is also well known in the śaiva
circles (TĀ XIII.327). According to Arcaṭa, the yogi (whose power of perception is at
stake) is he who possesses the yoga—to be understood in the dual sense of samādhi and
prajñā ‘faculty of discerning’ (Dharmottarapradīpa, p. 70 prajñā ca vivekakaraṇaśaktir
draṣṭavyā). Therefore, the yogi is the one who, at the same time, is permanently absorbed
(in samādhi) and intent in the activity of discernment (ibid. nityasamāhito vivekakaraṇa-
śaktitatparaś ca yogī). This interpretation is echoed by the Bauddhatarkabhāṣā (cf.
Kajiyama 1963: 53): “Yogi is he who possesses the yoga, in the sense of a) samādhi, i.e.
the concentration of the mind on a single point (cittaikāgratā°), and b) prajñā, the discrim-
inative knowledge of the ultimate truth of all things (niḥśesavastutattvavivecikā).” On the
‘way of bhāvanā’ (bhāvanāmārga) as the culmination of the ‘way of [intellectual] vision’
(darśanamārga), see Eltschinger forthcoming.
478 Observations on yogipratyakṣa
(PV III.281ab prāguktaṁ yogināṁ jñānaṁ teṣāṁ tad bhāvanāmayam).27 How-
ever, while bhāvanā is gradual by its very nature, becoming more and more in-
tense through constant practice, and operates on conceptual contents that are
progressively refined and dynamised till they cannot be distinguished from
direct perceptions, pratibhā, on the contrary, does not need any preparation or
gradation, for it enlightens and transforms instantly. The ascending hierarchy of
masters described in the TĀ begins with kalpita ‘formed, constructed’, proceeds
to kalpita-akalpita ‘formed-spontaneous,’ and concludes with akalpita ‘sponta-
neous’: the kalpita master is characterised by bhāvanā, and the akalpita master is
characterised by pratibhā. One could note that this may be suitable to an esoter-
ic and relatively marginal tradition, such as the Trika, less concerned than
Mīmāṁsā with defining an orthodoxy (to the limit that this term can be applied
to Indian religions) or at least with establishing an atemporal, non-human tradi-
tion as the cornerstone of the social and religious sphere.28 However, although it
cannot be denied that Abhinavagupta highly praises the ‘spontaneous’ (sāṁ-
siddhika) or ‘self-born’ (svayambhū) master, being able to tune himself with the
absolute without—or even against—any traditional teaching, the existence of
this ‘perfect,’ whose mere sight would suffice to liberate the man that may casu-
ally meet him (TĀ III.40), is presented as so exceptional and rare as to leave the
impression that this represents only a theoretical possibility, a borderline idea
conceived of in order that the too tightly controlled building of tradition should
not risk imploding. And while it is true that the Kiraṇa-tantra determines that
out of the three possible kinds of knowledge—respectively those arising from
the master, the scriptures and spontaneously—the latter is by far the highest
(vidyāpāda, IX.14ab), the texts mostly warn the adept against trusting to a mas-
ter who embodies such kind of knowledge—the ‘spontaneous’ or ‘self-born’
master—and, after all, recommend the ‘normative’ master (cfr. TĀ XXIII.7–10).
Thus, apparently it would remain only Buddhism which defends the pri-
macy of yogic perception without reservation. But is this indeed how things
stand? On a closer scrutiny, Buddhism seems quite far away from encouraging a
solitary tête-à-tête between the individual seeker, equipped with his supernormal
powers of perception, and truth. Yogic perception, Dharmakīrti clearly says,
cannot be a guarantee of truth by itself alone, but has to apply itself to a certain
27 This does not mean that bhāvanā coincides with yogipratyakṣa; rather, bhāvanā is what
makes yogipratyakṣa possible.
28 To this end, Mīmāṁsā will not hesitate even to downplay the significance of the cognitive
moment of the vedic seers themselves, an attitude that a careful observer can discern also
in Śaṅkara.
479Torella
content whose truthfulness has been ‘already’ guaranteed by a valid means of
knowledge, in this case the authoritative teaching of the Buddha (weighed by the
adept’s reason? See below). The object of meditation must be ‘real,’ and this
warning is introduced to exclude fancies, dreams or hallucinations, which
bhāvanā might have the power to render as vivid as real things. More generally,
the object of bhāvanā must have first passed, successfully, through the second of
the three levels of prajñā mentioned above, cintā ‘intellectual reflection.’ See
PV I.286ab tatra pramāṇaṁ samvādi yan prāṅnirṇītavastuvat, Pramāṇaviniścaya
I.28cd yaj jñānam avisaṁvādi tat pratyakṣam akalpakam, Nyāyabindu I.11
bhutārthabhāvanā° (which Dharmottara p. 70 comments upon: pramāṇa-
śuddhārthagrāhitvāc ca saṁvādakam). In this manner, yogipratyakṣa can match
also the second of the requirements that Dharmakīrti has established for praty-
akṣa in general: being kalpanāpoḍha and abhrānta (the former is echoed by PV
III.281c vidūtakalpanājālam, etc.). All authors agree that the object of medita-
tion par excellence (‘real’ as it has the guarantee of the Buddha, besides the
‘secondary’ rational verification by the adept) is the Four Noble Truths.29 Only
after such rational scrutiny, the job of bhāvanā can be carried out and be cogni-
tively significant: it progressively gives a dazzling aspect to that conceptual con-
tent and eliminates in it all discursive elaboration.
Therefore, the Buddhist yogi is not required (or allowed) to contemplate the
darkness of the universe in search of his own truth, but can exercise his powers
only on pre-defined objects already consecrated by (Buddhist!) tradition. In
other words, he knows at the very outset what he will have to find: neither more
nor less than the Four Noble Truths of the Buddha, which it is not up to him to
discover, but at most to re-discover, making them his own. The truths of Bud-
dhism are not accessible to normal perception or human reasoning: their original
discovery is due to the Buddha and we must derive them from him, but not prior
to examining his reliability.30 I am well aware that by saying so I am taking a
significant distance from the prevailing position in Buddhological studies,
according to which (cf. e.g. Franco forthcoming, Eltschinger forthcoming) the
29 As Eltschinger forthcoming notes, only Prajñākaragupta adds something: paraloka (Pra-
māṇavārttikālaṁkāra p. 327, on PV III.286b, prāṅnirṇītavastu paralokacaturāryasatyādikaṁ
tadviṣayam eva pratyakṣam).30 It has been noted that the characteristics ascribed to the Buddha, which guarantee his
status as a pramāṇa, have a definite counterpart (and also a possible source) in the
characteristics of the āpta, listed in Nyāyabhāṣya (Franco 1997: 29–42). On āpta in
Nyāyabhāṣya and his relationship with the yogi, see Biardeau 1964: 120–128. Inter-
estingly, Nyāyabhāṣya p. 97 notes: evam āptopadeśaḥ pramāṇam/ evaṁ cāptaḥ pramāṇam.
480 Observations on yogipratyakṣa
Buddhist adept submits the cardinal doctrines of Buddhism (above all, the Four
Noble Truths) to a personal scrutiny, and accepts them only after giving a
rational demonstration of them. But, if the Buddhist adept possesses all the cog-
nitive tools to ‘prove’ the Four Noble Truths by himself, I wonder why Buddhist
tradition has felt the need to strive so much to recognise Buddha’s status of
pramāṇa. A possible answer would be that the Buddha, as can be seen from the
texts, has arrived at the truths of Buddhism by way of direct (yogic) perception;
it is only the subsequent verification that may require the resort to inference, and
this is so precisely because the adept is not able to arrive at them by a spon-
taneous perception of his own (cf. the śruti-smṛti relationship, described in
Dharmaśāstra as a perception-inference relationship). But evidently this infer-
ential proof is not felt as a ‘strong’ proof, whence the resort to yogipratyakṣa-
bhāvanā to re-enact somehow the original pratyakṣa of the Buddha. One might
object that Buddhist tradition distinguishes two levels in the teaching of the
Buddha: one, of a mainly noetical character, lends itself to rational verification,
the other—rather concerning behaviours, ethical aspects, cosmology, ultramun-
dane life—constitutes the (strictu sensu) atīndriya component of it, and, as such,
is intrinsically inaccessible to rational scrutiny, only allowing a generic control
of non-contradiction (cf. Eltschinger 2007: 74–77, 100–101).31 Furthermore,
one might wonder whether the Buddha has attained the knowledge of this second
level thanks to special powers (yogipratyakṣa), which instead did not prove nec-
essary for the first level (the adept in fact being able to arrive at them by his ra-
tional forces alone). But since the Four Noble Truths are unanimously con-
sidered as the principal element (pradhāna; cf. e.g. PV I.217c), it seems hardly
plausible that the foundation of what is atīndriya might instead be cognised by
ordinary means (which the adept could reproduce by himself).
I deem it possible to abstract the following statement by Dharmakīrti from
its context (the scrutiny of Dignāga’s inclusion of scriptural authority in the do-
main of inference) and take it as a general truth: “Man is incapable of existing
without the support of revealed scripture” (PVsvavṛtti p. 108 nāyaṁ
puruṣo ’nāśrityāgamaprāmāṇyam āsituṁ samarthaḥ). Cf. Prajñākaragupta (p. 76
ad PV II.5b; cit. in Moriyama forthcoming): “Precisely for this, error is elimi-
nated only by the revealed doctrine (śāstra) pronounced by an omniscient, not by
any other person. Thus, a means of valid knowledge is only the omniscient’s
word. In the absolute sense, a means of valid knowledge is only the omni-
scient’s knowledge and nothing else. This is the ultimate truth. (ata eva
31 Interestingly, Prajñākaragupta seems somehow to unify the two levels, when he lists both
āryasatyāni and paraloka as the possible objects of yogipratyakṣa (see above fn. 29).
481Torella
śāstreṇaiva sarvajñoktena moho nivartyate, nānyenety anena prakāreṇa sarvajña-
vacanam eva pramāṇam iti paramārthataḥ sarvajñajñānam eva pramāṇam,
nāparam iti paramārthaḥ).
The word of the Buddha (buddhavacana) plays an essential role in the consti-
tution of Buddhist doctrine, and the authority of buddhavacana is based on the
conviction of his omniscience (and, for the Buddhists, also of his compassion).
This is apparent also from the attitude suggested by Kumārila, who in the Bṛhaṭ-
ṭīkā (cf. Kataoka 2003: 40–41) endeavours above all to confute the Buddhist
assertion: “The teaching [of the Buddha] constitutes a valid means of knowledge,
since it has been pronounced by the omniscient Buddha.”32 Although admitting
that yogipratyakṣa has been introduced by Dharmakīrti in a mainly soteriological
context (which seems different from Dignāga’s), it is a given fact that Kumārila
understands it and attacks it for its epistemological significance, having as his
principal aim challenging the notion of āpta/pramāṇa, referred to the Buddha,
which indeed rests primarily on the special power of perception of the yogi/
Buddha. In the progression of the Buddhist adept (cf. Eltschinger forthcoming),
yogipratyakṣa takes on the essential meaning of ‘meditation, inner cultivation’
(bhāvanā) and has the main function of eliminating the most subtle and insinu-
ating form of satkāyadṛṣṭi ‘the conviction that the I exists’, that called sahaja ‘in-
nate’—whereas the path of vision (darśanamārga) is sufficient to eliminate this in
its vikalpita (or parikalpita) version. Bhāvanā is the way to achieve the ‘natu-
ralness’ of such attainment, its taking place without any conscious effort (svarasa,
anābhoga). In sum, bhāvanā has in fact been given an ‘assimilative’ function
(and also a ‘purgative’ one in that it destroys kleśas), much more than a ‘cognitive’
function.33 Bhāvanā or yogic perception is applicable only at a subsequent stage
of engagement and in a subsidiary way, when the aim is to instill in the contents
of the teaching the necessary vividness for the spiritual path and everyday life to
32 That is, not because the truth of his teaching has been rationally proved.
33 It has been rightly stressed (Eltschinger forthcoming) that bhāvanā is only the means to
yogipratyakṣa, its cause (cf. PV III. 281b bhāvanāmayam, 284d bhāvanābalanirmitam;
Pramāṇaviniścaya I v. 31c bhāvanāpariniṣpattau; etc.). However, one might reply that at
the end (paryanta; cf. the Nyāyabindu quoted above) of the bhāvanā process, only the mo-
dality of the cognitive act changes (from conceptual to aconceptual), not its content. Re-
ferring to Jñānaśrīmitra’s statement, yogipratyakṣa is reliable only as far as it invests the
properties of the real thing (vastudharma), not the real thing itself; cf. Steinkellner 1978:
133. I would reply to Prevereau’s (1994: 76, fn. 2) nice formulation “it [yogipratyakṣa]
reveals truths, not facts” that, after all, the facts are precisely made by the totality of their
true aspects (including impermanence, and so on).
482 Observations on yogipratyakṣa
be imbued with it, and, possibly (as we have hypothesised above), also for the
teaching of the Buddha to be defended more efficaciously against its brahman-
ical opponents. It seems likely to conclude that, for the Buddhists, only percep-
tion is able to create ‘persuasion.’34 An indirect confirmation might come from
the fact that the Mīmāṁsakas direct such strong criticism precisely against the
Buddhist claim that yogipratyakṣa may be entitled to be classified as ‘percep-
tion.’35
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