Key idea of the Yoga Sūtras
prakṛti · nature, the seen
Everything that can be seen, the mind included, woven of the three guṇas.
Prakṛti, nature, is the other half of Patañjali's picture. In the Yoga Sūtras it mostly appears as 'the seen' (dṛśya): whatever can be an object, which includes the body, the senses and the mind. The seen has the nature of light, activity and stability, the three guṇas; it is made of the elements and the senses; and it exists for experience and for freedom (2.18). It unfolds in four stages, from the specific to the unmarked (2.19), and the subtlety of objects reaches as far as the unmanifest (1.45). The seen exists only for the seer's sake (2.21). When its purpose is fulfilled for one person, it does not end, because it is shared with others (2.22). Nature is not the enemy here. It gives the seer both a life and the means of release. Its creative power shows in transformation into another kind, which comes 'from the overflowing of nature' (4.2).
Vyāsa
“… these aspects (guṇa) are denoted by the word primary-cause. And this is called the object-of-sight. … For the object-of-sight exists for the sake of the experience and the liberation of the Self.”
Vyāsa's Yoga-bhāṣya in J. H. Woods' translation (1914), p. 144.
How it has been read
Sāṃkhya counts twenty-four principles of nature, from the unmanifest down to the elements; Patañjali names only the four stages of 2.19. Whether objects are real or only ideas is argued at 4.14–4.16, where Vyāsa rejects the view that there is no object apart from the mind.
A common misreading
Prakṛti is sometimes read as 'nature' in the sense of landscape, or as mere illusion. In the text it is the whole of the seen, the mind included (2.18), and objects are real, not mind-made (4.14–4.16).
Where the text defines it
- 1.45 And the subtlety of objects reaches as far as the unmanifest.
- 2.18 The seen has the nature of light, activity and stability; it is made of the elements and the senses, and exists for experience and for freedom.
- 2.19 The stages of the guṇas are the specific, the non-specific, the merely marked and the unmarked.
- 2.21 The very nature of the seen is only for the seer's sake.
- 2.22 Though it ends for one whose purpose is fulfilled, it does not end, because it is shared with others.
- 4.2 Transformation into another kind comes from the overflowing of nature.