Abstract
Recent work has clearly established the fundamental place of the siddhis in almost all Indic mokṣa traditions. This paper seeks to excavate a fundamental metaphysical dimension to this phenomenon, by excavating the philosophical logic of these claims from within the contours of Sāṃkhya metaphysics as expressed in the Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali. It will set out to provide a coherent explanation of how these siddhis are not only an inherent ingredient of yogic discourse, but a logical and perhaps inevitable corollary of the parameters of this metaphysics. It will thus take the issue further than a mere recognition of the centrality of the siddhis to yogic practice and discourse by laying out the sequential metaphysics underpinning them, and hence arguing that siddhis are not only fundamental and intrinsic to the Sāṃkhya/Yoga tradition, but an essential by-product of its metaphysical presuppositions.
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Notes
“Siddhis in the Yoga Sūtras” in Jacobsen, Knut. Yoga Powers: Extraordinary Capacities Attained Through Meditation and Concentration. Brills Indological Library vol 23, 2011 (henceforth, ibid), 223–239
“Power and meaning in the Yoga Sütra of Patañjali.” Ibid, 195–222.
Lanman reports that these accounts originated “from the pen of Sir Claude Martin Wade, who was an actual eye- witness” to one such event.
The Integrity of the Yoga Darśana. New York: SUNY press, 1998.
The Philosophy of Classical Yoga New York: St. Martin’s press, 1980.
“Yoga Powers in the Mahābhārata’“Ibid, 33–60.
“The Cultivation of yogic Powers in the Pāli Path Manuals of Theravāda Biddhism. “Ibid, 77–95.
“The Wondrous Display of Superhuman Power in the VimilakîrtinirdeΩa: Miracle or Marvel? “Ibid, 97–122-144.
“On the Appearance of Siddhis in Chinese Buddhist Texts” Ibid, 127–144.
Like other old world cultures, the dominant religious expression in the early Vedic period within which Yoga emerges is that of the sacrificial cult wherein animals and other items are offered to various gods through the medium of fire for the purposes of obtaining worldly boons. The Vedic hymns often express a lusty desire for very earthly boons such as cows, offspring, victory over enemies, etc., which the sacrificer in the earlier Vedic period attempted to obtain by cajoling the gods who controlled such things (and, in the middle Vedic period, by mastering the technology of mantra and ritual such that the gods were constrained to bestow these boons - implied in Yoga Sütras IV.1).
Los Angeles: Self Realization Fellowship, 1997.
South Fallsburg: SYDA, 2000.
Hoesdale, PA: Himalayan International Institute, 2000.
“Siddhi and Mahāsiddhi in Early Haṭhayoga.” in Ibid, 327–344.
Yoga Body New York, 2010.
22 Aṇu, literally ‘minute,’ (in the quantitative
Aṇu, literally ‘minute,’ (in the quantitative sense of tiny), a term typically translated by Indologists of the nineteenth century and subsequently retained as ‘atom,’ is the smallest individualized particle of matter in existence. In point of fact, an aṇu is an irreducible entity in the sense that it cannot be further broken down into smaller parts whereas atoms are particles reducible into smaller entities (such as electrons and protons, etc.), so ‘atom’ is not an accurate translation, hence I have sometimes referred to it, somewhat unsatisfactorily, as ‘sub-atomic particles’. Of course, In Sāmkhya, aṇus themselves are ultimately composed of the guṇas; they are simply the smallest entities into which the guṇas can exist in the distinct forms of the mahābhūtas, gross elements of earth, water, etc., without reverting back to subtler energies such as the tanmātras or ahaṃkāra, etc.
The commentators take dharma to refer to an object’s characteristics; lakṣaña to its situation in time (i.e. past, present or future); and avasthā to its condition - new or old, etc.).
See II.19 for how something can be viśeṣa and aviśeṣa, viz. a dharma and dharmin.
The kleśas are the psychic ‘afflictions’ that cause puruṣa to misidentify with what it is not (the mind and body), and hence remain trapped in the cycle of birth and death by dint of the law of karma, action and reaction (II.5ff).
Technically, saṃyama is defined in III.4 as dhāraṇā, concentration; dhyāna, meditation; and samādhi, absorption, performed together. One might presume that the yogī (at least most yogīs) cannot just snap into a state of samādhi instantaneously. The mind has to be gradually eased away from external awareness and progressively stilled through the stages of dhārañā and dhyāna first.
Dīgha Mahavagga III.12.42
Āpastamba- sūtra II.9.23.6–8; Sāma-vidhāna III.9.1.
Añima, the ability to become minute, as first on the list, refers to the standard eight mystic powers.
“Supernatural Powers and Their Attainment in Jainism.” Ibid, 145–194.
Quoted in Jaini (1974, 73).
Pāsādika Suttanta 29 (Rhys Davis 1927, part III, 127).
See e.g. Praśna Upaniṣad IV.10–11; Vedānta Sūtras IV.4.17 and commentaries. (In Vedānta, this omnipotency
stops short of being able to create the universe, however, which only Īśvara can do).
Vaiśeṣika Sūtras IX.1.1ff.
However the padārtha categories of Vaiśeṣika and Nyāya, such as dharma/dharmin, samavāya, samānya, viśeṣa, etc., are adopted by Vedāntins (e.g. Rāmānuja in his Gītā bhāṣya, whose naming of his own siddhānta, viśiṣtādvaita reflects such influence), but they are subsumed into a Sāmkhya satkarya substratum.
References
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Lanman, C. R. (1971). Hindu ascetics and their powers. Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, XIVIII, 133–151.
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Müller, M. (1912). The six systems of Indian philosophy (2nd ed.). London: Longmans.
Pensa, C. (1969). On the purification concept in Indian tradition with special regard to yoga. East and West, 19, 194–228.
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Some of the material for this paper has its roots in my recent translation and commentary of the Yoga Sūtras (New York: North Point Press, 2009).
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Bryant, E.F. The Metaphysical Logic of the Siddhis, Mystic Powers, in Patañjali’s Yoga Sūtra. DHARM 3, 3–15 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42240-020-00073-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s42240-020-00073-z