Can ignorance have a beginning?
What caused the Cause: Moksha, Kaivalyam, Enlightenment Part IV
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Kunal
Om Sri Gurubhyo Namah. Salutations to all the teachers.
सेयं भ्रान्तिर्निरालम्बा सर्वन्यायविरोधिनौ।सहते न विचार सा तमो यद्विद्दिवाकरम्॥SaEyam bhraantiNiraalambanaa sarvaNyaayaVirodhinauSahate na vichaara saa tamo yadViddiVaakaramThis illusion (ie. avidya) is without support, and is contradictory to logic. It cannot bear reasoning just as darkness cannot bear the Sun.
- Survesvaracharya, Naishkarmyasiddhih, 3.66
Calling Yoga “spiritual” can make it sound as though it is a matter of belief - an afterthought in a practical world of facts and reason.
Yoga is, however, based in reason and experience. It is open to questions, logical analysis, and thorough experimentation. It is not something to be believed in, but rather a practical set of techniques that provides real results to the deepest of all problems.
P: What’s the problem?
Jogi: Dukkha.
We suffer. Our minds are scattered. We feel sad, angry, disappointed, upset, irritated, and anxious. Everything changes despite our best efforts to create stability and permanence. We grow old, we get sick, we die. Even our most pleasurable experiences are momentary - lasting only for a little while before they disappear, leaving us to strive for their elongation or long for their return. Life is rough, uncomfortable, and difficult - a bumpy ride.
Many of us choose to simply ignore this fact, even though it stares us in the face every day of our lives.
One may say “this is gloomy”, or “focus on the positives.” This is reasonable, however, both can be true. We can focus on the positive without ignoring the negative. No matter how much we put our heads in the sand, suffering remains.
If we want a way out, we must first acknowledge the problem.1
Traditional Indian medicine suggests a fourfold method for doctors to communicate with their patients:
Rogah (रोगः): The Diagnosis
Hetuh (हेतुः): The Etiology, or the Cause
Aarogyam (आरोग्यं): The Prognosis
Bhaishajyam (भैषज्यं): The Treatment
In our case, the diagnosis is dukkha. Acknowledging this truth is the first step on the path to solving it.
The immediate cause of suffering, as we have been discussing, is the conjunction between the Seer and the Seen. This cause has a further cause - avidya, or the Primal Ignorance:
Over the past few weeks, we have discussed the nature of dukkha and the conjunction between the Seer and the Seen. Last week, we began a discussion on how the conjunction manifests as the confusion of the Owner and the Owned. Am I the body, or does it belong to me? As we investigate, we find that neither am I the body, and nor do I have any claim to it. I am the Purusha - the eternal Witness to the body and mind. You can find the three articles here:
It seems that despite understanding this confusion at an intellectual level, we still suffer. We can reason, using the buddhi, that we are not the body, that we are not the mind. We can understand that both suffering as well as the experiencer of suffering are both located in the realm of the Seen - Prakriti - and that the Seer simply observes the suffering as well as the classification of pratyayas (loosely, mental activity) into the category of suffering. Yet, despite this understanding, we still suffer. Why is this the case?
The reason for this lingering dukkha, despite intellectual understanding, is avidya.
तस्य हेतुरविद्या।Tasya heturAvidyaThe cause is avidya (ie. the Primal Ignorance).
- Yoga Sutra, 2.24
It manifests through the other four kleshas, which grow from avidya just as plants grow from a field. You can find more on the kleshas here:
अविद्या क्षेत्रम् उत्तरेषां प्रसुप्ततनुविच्छिन्नोदाराणाम्।Avidya Kshetram Uttareshaam PrasuptaTanuVichhinaUdaaraanaam[Primal] Ignorance (ie. avidya) is the field [for all the other kleshas] which can be [in one of four states] dormant, attenuated, interrupted, or active.
- Yoga Sutras 2.4
Avidya is the root cause of suffering. If we can root it out, suffering disappears along with it, just as when soil is washed away, the plants within it are also washed away, or just as once fuel is extinguished, fire ceases to burn.
P: How do we know this?
Jogi: Suffering - like any experience - requires a subject and an object. When we suffer, we try to relieve ourselves of the suffering by chasing and trying to adjust the objects. If I am hungry, I think the suffering is caused by a lack of food, and so I seek food. If I am lonely I seek friends. If I am acquisitive, I seek material possessions. However, all of these solutions are impermanent, and so suffering is bound to return. However, this kind of effort to relieve suffering focuses on the wrong part of the equation - the object of suffering rather than the subject. The “I” who suffers is common to all suffering. Seek out the cause of the “I” - once we see that there is no “I” to suffer, there can be no suffering.
P: Isn’t this suicidal?
Jogi: Not quite. Suicide implies a death of the body. This is simply a Realization that the separate self never existed in the first place.
What is the cause of avidya?
विपर्ययज्ञानवासनेत्यर्थः।ViparyayaJnaanaVaasanaItiArthah[Avidya is] the force of habit of erroneous cognition [of Reality].
- Vyasabhashyam on Yoga Sutra, 2.24
Avidya is not quite as simple as a lack of some special information, but rather a deeper seated misperception of Reality, which filters our entire view of the Universe. It is what makes us feel like we are somehow seated behind the eyes, attached to a particular body and mind, suffering as the body and mind suffers. It is what generates the world of objects, and attaches us to them.
So what is its cause?
If the Conjunction of Seer and Seen has a cause (ie. avidya), then it is reasonable to assume that avidya also has a cause. After all, all causes are simply effects of prior causes.
However, when we investigate, we find that we cannot quite point out a cause for avidya.
The traditional commentators to the Yoga Sutras go over some possibilities:
Option 1: The play of the gunas
Is ignorance the result of the play of the gunas?
As a reminder, the gunas are the three inseparable, constantly shifting and changing, components of Prakriti, or nature - the Seen. They are sattva (lucidity, calmness, peacefulness, clarity, etc.), rajas (activity, passion, movement, etc.), and tamas (dullness, inertia, heaviness, etc.).
Everything we experience - from the world outside the skin to the body, and even the mind and the thoughts within it, are nothing but permutations of these three gunas in varying combinations. You can find more on the gunas here:
As we have discussed, there are only really two things2. Since the Purusha is simply Awareness - like sunlight that shines upon all things indiscriminately, unaffected by the quality of the object that is illuminated - the only other option is Prakriti.
Upon investigation, we find that it is true that avidya continues for as long as the gunas are active. However, this does not explain avidya. Traditional commentators compare this line of reasoning to a person who explains a fever by saying that there is heat in the body. The heat in the body is a characteristic of fever, but does not explain its cause. Similarly, the play of the gunas - the world of objects around us - is a result or characteristic of avidya, but is not a satisfying explanation for the cause of avidya.
Option 2: Failure of the mind
Is ignorance simply a failure of the mind?
Specifically, is it that the mind has failed to correctly grasp the distinction between the Seer and the Seen, even though the knowledge is right there in front of it?
This is certainly true. However, this does not explain the cause of avidya either. Traditional commentators compare this line of reasoning to the sentence “illness means to be unwell.” It is another way of describing the situation, but, like the previous line of reasoning, does not explain the cause.
Option 3: Failure of the gunas
Does avidya stem from a failure of the gunas to produce correct knowledge?
Specifically is it that the gunas have simply failed to generate vivek - the ability to distinguish between the Ser and the Seen, even though this knowledge is latent within them?
This is similar to the last argument in that it is mostly correct, but is of limited value as an explanation. It is true that vivek is latent within the gunas, and it is only due to this fact that it is able to arise when Yoga is practised. However, it does not explain the cause of avidya.
Additionally, the gunas are constantly in flux, and eternal. All things stem from the gunas and dissolve back into them. Ultimately everything, is simply a combination of the gunas, shifting and changing continuously. If avidya were another effect of the gunas, it would also be eternal, and so there would be no end to it.
However, avidya is ignorance, and like any ignorance, it must have its end in knowledge.
As a result, this explanation does not satisfactorily explain the cause of avidya.
Option 4: Does it impel Prakriti to continue?
Prakriti, as we know, is always in flux. This constant fluctuation of the gunas manifests as the impermanence of the objects around us. Avidya results in the movement of Prakriti, however this line of reasoning does not provide a satisfactory answer to the cause of avidya itself.
Option 5: The power of Prakriti to reveal herself to Purusha
Is the cause of avidya the power and/or capability of Prakriti to reveal herself to Purusha?
Said another way, is avidya caused by the capability of the Seen to be observed by the Seer?
Prakriti is revealed to Purusha as a result of avidya, in that the Seer recognizes objects in the Universe by identifying as a separate observer. However, this does not explain the cause of avidya itself. Rather, calling it the “power of Prakriti” is just a manner of describing avidya.
This is similar to the statement “light is the power of fire” - light is not the cause of the fire, it is simply a characteristic that can be used to describe it.
Option 6: Is avidya the result of the conjunction?
In our current situation, it appears as though there is a Seer and Seen - Purusha and Prakriti. Prakriti, or nature, is not conscious in and of itself, but rather appears to be conscious due to the reflection of Purusha (ie. the Phantom Consciousness) in the sattvic aspect of the buddhi. This is just like an image of the moon appears in a lake, and although the lake itself is not luminous, the reflection sheds light on objects around it. Additionally, we consider ourselves to be a body-mind, and identify with this particular body-mind, up to the tips of the hair and fingernails, and not beyond. Said another way, we are under the spell of avidya. Both of these - the conjunction and avidya (ie. ignorance) - are concurrent in our experience.
The buddhi appears to be ignorant, but it only appears this way due to the fact that Purusha is illuminating it with Awareness.
The Purusha also appears to be ignorant, but only due to its awareness of the buddhi. That is, avidya appears only when Purusha’s awareness is reflected back from the buddhi, which is within Prakriti.
In this way, it seems that avidya is the product of the coming together of Purusha and Prakriti - is this conjunction the cause of avidya?
This analysis is correct. However, it is similar to saying that sight is dependent on light. Avidya is dependent on the conjunction between Purusha and Prakriti, but that does not explain the cause of avidya. Regardless, it is closer than most of the other lines of reasoning.
Option 7: Is ignorance caused by knowledge?
What does it mean to know? From a Yogic perspective, knowledge occurs when the Purusha shines its light of awareness on something within Prakriti. Said another way, when we say we know, we mean that we know something. There is a subject and an object. All objects, all “things”, are within Prakriti, and the subject is the Purusha. Therefore, knowledge only occurs when Purusha and Prakriti come together.
Since avidya also appears when Purusha and Prakriti come together, does this mean that knowledge is itself the cause of ignorance?
In a sense, this analysis is correct. All knowledge is Prakritic, and avidya arises alongside the conjunction between the Purusha and Prakriti. However, this does not explain the cause of avidya. Just because two things arise in similar circumstances does not mean that one causes the other.
It is like noticing that poision ivy and spinach both grow in similar conditions, and often grow near each other, and then making the claim that the cause of poison ivy is spinach. They arise in the same set of conditions, but that does not mean that they are causally connected. In this way, this line of reasoning also does not explain the cause of avidya.
Option 8: Does avidya remain latent as a samskaara?
A final analysis suggests that avidya remains latent as a samskaara, or impression, within the gunas, and activates once it finds an appropriate container. That is, when the samskaara of avidya finds itself within the field of a mind, it activates, and this is what causes avidya.
Is the cause of avidya a latent seed within the gunas?
This line of reasoning is accepted by the Yoga school, and we will discuss this further as we get further into the goal of Yoga - the removal of avidya. However, it does not explain the cause of avidya. After all, even if it is in seed form, it is still there, and this explanation does not provide any reasoning about how it ended up there in the first place.
The common factor within all of these options is that there is some relationship between avidya and the conjunction of Purusha and Prakriti. However, despite all these attempts at reasoning to arrive at the cause of avidya, it seems that there is no satisfactory answer.
As a matter of fact, the most widely accepted explanation of the cause of avidya, even outside of the Yoga school, is that avidya is both beginningless and causeless.
P: But isn’t that just a cop-out? There must be a cause, no?
Avidya is beginningless and causeless.
Saying that avidya is beginningless and causeless can feel like a cop-out. After all, just because we can’t think of an explanation doesn’t mean there isn’t one.
However, there is a reason for this. Avidya is, after all, ignorance. Specifically, it is ignorance of the true nature of the distinction between Purusha and Prakriti.
All ignorance, not just avidya, is causeless and beginningless.
Consider the cause of your ignorance of any piece of information. Can you point to it? What about the beginning? Can you say when your ignorance of something began?
To make this clear, consider the following conversation between our friends Jogi and Purvapaksha (aka P).
Jogi: Do you know German?
P: No.
Jogi: So are you ignorant of German?
P: Yes.
Jogi: When did your ignorance begin?
P: At birth I suppose.
Jogi: So then you were not ignorant of German before your birth?
P: No, that is not the case either.
Jogi: In this way, any ignorance is beginningless. Now what is the cause of your ignorance of German?
P: I don’t know, I guess because I never learned it.
Jogi: That is like jumping into a pool and saying that the cause of your wetness is the fact that you did not dry yourself. The cause of your wetness is the fact that you jumped into the pool. In this way, what is the cause of your ignorance of German?
P: I cannot point to a cause - it was just there.
Jogi: In this way, all ignorance is causeless and beginningless. However, it can end. How can you end your ignorance of German?
P: By learning German.
Jogi: In the same way, knowledge removes ignorance, even though the ignorance is causeless and beginningless, it is removed by knowledge in the same way that darkness is removed by light in an instant, even if the darkness has been there for a thousand years.
In this way, avidya, just like any ignorance, has no cause and no beginning. Yet, as with any ignorance, it has a possible end. Knowledge removes ignorance just like light removes darkness.
Specifically, this is knowledge where the locus and the subject of the ignorance is the same as the locus and subject of the knowledge.
For example, if you don’t know German, the locus of the ignorance is your mind, and the subject is the German language.
Now in order to remove the ignorance, the locus and subject of knowledge must both be the same as the locus and subject of ignorance.
Specifically, consider if your friend learned German. Would your ignorance of German be removed?
P: No, of course not.
Jogi: Correct. Even though the subject of knowledge is the same as the subject of ignorance (ie. the German language), the locus of knowledge is different from the locus of ignorance (ie. your mind). As a result, the ignorance is not removed.
Now what if you learned Spanish? Would this remove your ignorance of German?
P: No, of course not.
Jogi: Correct again. Even though the locus of knowledge is the same as the locus of ignorance (ie. your mind), the subject of knowledge (ie. the Spanish language) is different from the subject of ignorance (ie. the German language).
As a final example, if you learned German, would that remove your ignorance of German?
P: Yes.
Jogi: Correct. The locus and the subject of knowledge are both the same as the locus and subject of ignorance, and as a result, the ignorance is removed.
P: So then what is the locus and subject of avidya?
This is a complex topic and will be discussed in more detail in a future article. If you are interested, there is a famous series of arguments between the great Ramanuja and post-Shankara Advaitins in a book called Saptavidhaa Anupapatti (the Seven Great Untenables). Briefly, however, although reasoning can bring us right to the very end of the journey, logical reasoning about avidya (ie. the final obstacle, at the very end of the journey) cannot bear any result.
P: Why?
The reason for this is that all logical reasoning is itself seen through the lens of avidya. The use of categories and language is a product of avidya, and as a result any logic cannot be free of it.
P: But then what about once avidya is removed? Can’t we understand its cause then?
Once avidya is removed, the only means to uncover its nature and cause would be Jnana, ie. the Purusha, independent of the mind and other products of the gunas. Using Jnana to uncover the nature and cause of avidya is compared to trying to use light to find darkness. The moment light is used, darkness will be removed, and so any attempt to do so is doomed to failure. This is not because the darkness does not exist, but rather because its very nature is opposed to the means of uncovering it.
However, for our purposes as Yogis, our goal is not to establish avidya, but rather to cut it down.
“If your house is on fire, the most urgent thing to do is to go back and try to put out the fire, not to run after the person you believe to be the arsonist.”
- Thich Nhat Hanh
P: So can it be removed?
Jogi: Yes. That is the gospel - the good news.
P: And what happens once we remove it?
The prognosis of our condition will be the focus of our discussion next time.
Next time: The Prognosis: Kaivalyam
However, there are many who are not interested in acknowledging the problem, and that is ok. There is no need to force or compel others to acknowledge the fact - Yoga is an entirely personal journey.
In the Yoga school, which is a dualistic point of view, there are two fundamental entities - Purusha and Prakriti. In Advaita Vedanta, which we will cover in future articles, the Seen is subsumed within, or sublated by, the Seer.