MANAS OR THE INWARD SENSE: THE TEN EXTERNAL FACULTIES OF SENSATION AND ACTION
In its list of the tattvas, after individual consciousness (ahaṇkāra), the Sāṇkhya goes on to describe the five tanmātras, subtle elementary determinations, incorporeal therefore and outwardly imperceptible, belonging to the same group of productive productions. In an immediate sense they constitute respectively the principles of the five bhütas or corporeal and sensible elements and receive their finite expression in the particular conditions of individual existence prevailing at the level of the human state. The word tanmātra literally means an 'assignment' (mātra, 'measure', 'determination') delimiting the proper sphere of a given quality (tat, 'that', taken here in the sense of 'quiddity', like the Arabic dat) [1] in universal Existence; but this is not the place to enter into fuller details on this subject. We will merely remark that the five tanmātras are usually indicated by the names of the sensible qualities: auditive or sonorous (shabda), tangible (sparsha), visible (rüpa, with the double sense of form and color), sapid (rasa), and olfactory (gandha); but these qualities must be looked upon here as existing in a relatively principial and 'non-developed' state
only, since it is through the bhūtas alone that they will be actually manifested in the sensible order; furthermore, the relation of the tanmātras to the bhūtas is analogous, in its relative degree, to that of 'essence' to 'substance', so that the term 'elementary essences' could be applied accurately enough to the tanmātras. [2] The five bhūtas, in the order of their production or of their manifestation (an order parallel to that just indicated for the tanmātras, since a corresponding sensible quality goes with each element), are Ether (Ākāsha), Air (Vāyu), Fire (Tejas), Water (Ap), and Earth (Prithvī or Prithivī): and it is from these that the whole of gross or corporeal manifestation is made up.
Between the tanmātras and the bhūtas, and constituting along with the latter the group of 'unproductive productions', there are eleven distinct and specifically individual faculties which proceed from ahaṇkāra, and which, at the same time, all participate in the five tanmātras. Of the eleven faculties in question ten are external, five of sensation and five of action; the eleventh, which is concerned with both these functions, is the inward sense or mental faculty (manas), and this is directly attached to consciousness (ahaṇkāra). [3] It is to manas that we must refer individual thought, which belongs to the formal order (and which includes reason as well as memory and imagination); [4] it is in no way inherent to the transcendent intellect (Buddhi), the attributes of which are essentially formless. It is worth remarking in this connection that, for Aristotle also, pure intellect is of a transcendent order and can claim knowledge of universal principles as its proper object; this knowledge, which is not discursive in any respect, is acquired directly and immediately by intellectual intuition. To avoid any misunderstanding it should be added that this intuition has nothing at all to do with the so-called
'intuition' of a merely sensitive and vital order, which plays such a prominent part in the decidedly anti-metaphysical theories of certain contemporary philosophers.
As for the development of the different faculties of individual man, it is enough to quote the teaching of the Brahma-Sūtras on this subject:
The intellect, the inward sense, and also the faculties of sensation and action, are developed [in manifestation] and reabsorbed [into the unmanifested] in a similar sequence [except that reabsorption proceeds in an inverse order to that of development], [5] and this sequence always follows that of the elements from which these faculties proceed as regards their constitution [with the exception, however, of the intellect, which is developed in the formless order prior to the determination of any formal or properly individual principle]. As to Purusha (or Ātmā), its emanation [insofar as it is regarded as the personality of a being] is not a birth [even in the widest meaning of the word], [7] neither is it a production [implying a starting-point for its actual existence, as is the case for everything that proceeds from Prakriti]. One cannot in fact, assign to it any limitation [by any particular condition of existence], since, being identified with the Supreme Brahma, it partakes of its infinite essence [implying the possession of the divine attributes, at least virtually and even actually
insofar as this participation is effectively realized in the Supreme Identity, not to speak of all that lies beyond any attribution whatsoever, since here we are contemplating the Supreme Brahma, which is nirguna, and not merely Brahma as saguna, that is to say Ishvara]. [9] It is active, but only in principle [therefore 'actionless'], [10] for this activity (kartritva) is not essential to it nor inherent in it, but is simply eventual and contingent [merely relative to its states of manifestation]. As the carpenter, grasping in his hand his axe and his other tools and then laying them aside, enjoys tranquillity and repose, so this Ātmā in its union with its instruments [by means of which its principial faculties are expressed and developed in each of its states of manifestation, and which are thus nothing but the manifestations of these faculties with their respective organs], is active [although this activity in no way affects its inmost nature], and, in relinquishing them, enjoys repose and tranquillity [in the 'inaction' from which, in itself, it never departed]. [11]
The various faculties of sensation and action [indicated by the word prāna in a secondary acceptation] are eleven in number: five of sensation [buddhīndriyas or jñānendriyas, means or instruments of knowledge in their own particular sphere], five of action [karmendriyas], and the inward sense [manas]. Where a greater number [thirteen] is given, the term indriya is employed in its widest and most comprehensive sense, distinguishing within manas, by reason of the plurality of its functions, the intellect [not in itself and insofar as it belongs to the transcendent order, but as a particular determination relative to the individual], the individual consciousness [ahaṇkāra, from which manas cannot be separated], and the inward sense properly so
called [what the Scholastic philosophers term sensorium commune]. Where a lesser number [usually seven] is given, the same term is applied in a more restricted manner: thus, seven sensible organs are specified, the two eyes, the two ears, the two nostrils and the mouth or tongue [so that, in this case, we are dealing merely with the seven openings or orifices of the head]. The eleven faculties mentioned above [although indicated collectively by the term prāna] are not [as are the five vāyus of which we shall speak later] simple modifications of the mukhya-prāna or principal vital act [respiration, with the assimilation ensuing from it], but distinct principles [from the special point of view of human individuality]. [12]
The term prāna, in its most usual acceptation, really means 'vital breath'; but in certain Vedic texts it serves to describe something which, in the universal sense, is identified in principle with Brahma itself, as when it is said that in deep sleep (sushupti), all the faculties are reabsorbed into prāna, since 'while a man sleeps without dreaming, his spiritual principle (Ātmā viewed in relation to him) is one with Brahma, [13] this state being beyond distinction and therefore truly supra-individual: that is why the word svapiti, 'he sleeps', is interpreted as swam apito bhavati, 'he has entered into his own (Self). [14]
As to the word indriya, it really means 'power', which is also the primary meaning of the word 'faculty'; but, by extension, it comes to mean, as has already been pointed out, both the faculty and its bodily organ, which are thus described by one and the same word and which are considered as constituting in combination a single instrument, either of knowledge (buddhi or jnāna, these terms being here taken in their widest sense), or of action (karma). The five instruments of sensation are: the ears or hearing (shrotra), the skin or touch (tvach), the eyes or sight (chakshus), the tongue or
taste (rasana), the nose or smell (ghrāna), being enumerated thus in the order of development of the senses. which is that of the corresponding elements (bhütas); but, to explain this correspondence in detail, it would be necessary to discuss fully the conditions of corporeal existence, which we cannot undertake to do here. The five instruments of action are: the organs of excretion (pāyu), the generative organs (upastha), the hands (pāni), the feet (pāda), and lastly the voice or organ of speech (vāch), [15] which is reckoned as the tenth. Manas must be regarded as the eleventh, fulfilling in its own nature a double function of service both toward perception and toward action, and partaking in consequence of the properties of each, which it centralizes to a certain extent within itself. [16]
According to the Sāṇkhya, these faculties with their respective organs are (distinguishing three faculties in Manas) the thirteen instruments of knowledge in the sphere of human individuality (for the end of action is not in action itself but only insofar as it relates to knowledge): three are internal and ten external, compared to three sentinels and ten gates (consciousness being inherent in the former, but not in the latter when viewed distinctively). A bodily sense perceives, and an organ of action executes (the one being, as it were, an 'entry' and the other an 'outgoing': there are here two successive and complementary phases, of which the first is a centripetal and the second a centrifugal movement); between the two, the inward sense (manas) examines; consciousness (ahaṇkāra) makes the individual application, that is to say the assimilation of the perception by the 'ego', of which it henceforth becomes part as a secondary modification; and, finally, the pure intellect (Buddhi) transposes the data of the preceding faculties into the Universal.