PURUSHA UNAFFECTED BY INDIVIDUAL MODIFICATIONS
According to the Bhagavad-Gìtā,
there are in the world two Purushas, the one destructible and the other indestructible; the first is distributed among all beings; the second is immutable. But there is another Purusha, the highest [uttama], which is called Paramātmā, and which, as imperishable Lord, pervades and sustains three worlds [the earth, the air, and the heavens, representing the three fundamental degrees between which all the modes of manifestation are distributed]. As I transcend the destructible and even the indestructible [being the supreme Principle of the one and of the other], I am extolled in the world and in the Veda under the name of Purushottama. [1]
Of the first two Purushas, the destructible is jīvātmā, whose separate existence is in fact transitory and contingent like that of the individuality itself; and the 'indestructible' is Ātmā considered as the personality, permanent principle of the being through all its states of manifestation; [2] as for the third, it is Paramātmā as the text explicitly
declares, the personality of which is a primordial determination, in accordance with the explanation we have previously given. True as it is to say that the personality is really beyond the realm of multiplicity, we may nevertheless, in a certain sense, speak of a personality for each being (we refer, naturally, to the being as a whole, and not to one of its states viewed in isolation). That is why the Sāṇkhya, the point of view of which does not attain to Purushottama, often describes Purusha as multiple; but it should be noticed that, even in this case, its name is always employed in the singular, so as to emphasize its essential unity. The Sāṇkhya has nothing in common, therefore, with any 'monadism' of the kind associated with the name of Leibnitz, where, moreover, it is the 'individual substance' which is regarded as a complete whole, forming a sort of closed system, a conception incompatible with any notion of a truly metaphysical order.
Purusha, considered as identical with the personality, 'is, so to speak, [3] a portion [ansha] of the Supreme Ruler [who, however, is really without parts, being absolutely indivisible and 'without duality'], as a spark is a portion of the fire [the nature of which is wholly present in every spark]. [4] It is not subject to the conditions which
determine the individuality, and even in its relations therewith it remains unaffected by individual modifications (such as pleasure and pain, for example), which are purely contingent and accidental, and not essential to the being, since they all proceed from the plastic principle, Prakriti or Pradhāna, as from a single root. It is from this substance, containing all the possibilities of manifestation potentially, that modifications are produced in the manifested sphere, by the actual development of these possibilities, or, to use the Aristotelian expression, by their passage from potency to act. 'All modification [parināma],' says Vijñāna-Bhikshu, 'from the original production of the world [that is to say, of each cycle of existence] to its final dissolution, proceeds exclusively from Prakriti and her derivatives,' that is to say from the twenty-four tattvas of the Sānhkya.
Purusha is, however, the essential principle of all things, since it is Purusha which determines the development of the possibilities of Prakriti; but it never itself enters manifestation, so that all things, insofar as they are viewed distinctively, are different from it, and nothing which concerns them in their distinctive development (that is to say, in 'becoming') can affect its immutability.
Thus the solar or lunar light [capable of manifold modifications] appears identical with that which gives birth to it [the luminous source, considered as immutable itself], but nevertheless it is distinct therefrom [in external manifestation; likewise modifications or manifested qualities are, as such, distinct from their essential principle, in that they can in no manner affect it]. As the image of the sun reflected in water quivers and fluctuates in accordance with the undulations of the water, yet without affecting the other images reflected therein, much less the solar orb itself, so the modifications of one individual leave other individuals unaffected and, so much the more so, the Supreme Ruler Himself, [5]
who is Purushottama, and with whom the Personality is in reality identical in its essence, just as all sparks are identical with fire considered as indivisible in its innermost nature.
It is the 'living soul' (jīvātmā) which is here compared to the image of the sun in water, as being the reflection (ābhāsa) in the individual realm, and relative to each individual, of the Light, principially one, of the 'Universal Spirit' (Ātmā); and the luminous ray which confers existence upon this image, connecting it with its source, is, as we shall see later on, the higher intellect (Buddhi), belonging to the realm of formless manifestation. [6] As for the water, which reflects the solar light, it is habitually regarded as the symbol of the plastic principle (Prakriti), the image of 'universal passivity'; this symbol, moreover, bearing the same meaning, is common to all traditional doctrines. [7] Here, however, a limitation must be imposed on its general sense, since Buddhi, although formless and supraindividual, is nonetheless manifested, and consequently derives from Prakriti, of which it is the first production: the water can
therefore only represent here the potential sum of formal possibilities, or in other words, the realm of manifestation in the individual mode, and thus it leaves outside itself those formless possibilities which, while corresponding with states of manifestation, must nonetheless be referred to the Universal. [8]