Part 22 - Citta

The word Yoga which was formerly used in Vedic literature in the sense of the restraint of the senses is used by Patañjali in his Yoga sūtra in the sense of the partial or full restraint or steadying of the states of citta. Some sort of concentration may be brought about by violent passions, as when fighting against a mortal enemy, or even by an ignorant attachment or instinct. The citta which has the concentration of the former type is called kṣipta (wild) and of the latter type pramūdha (ignorant). There is another kind of citta, as with all ordinary people, in which concentration is only possible for a time, the mind remaining steady on one thing for a short time leaves that off and clings to another thing and so on. This is called the vikṣipta (unsteady) stage of mind (cittabhūmi). As distinguished from these there is an advanced stage of citta in which it can concentrate steadily on an object for a long time. This is the ekāgra (one-pointed) stage. There is a still further advanced stage in which the citta processes are absolutely stopped. This happens immediately before mukti, and is called the nirodha (cessation) state of citta. The purpose of Yoga is to achieve the conditions of the last two stages of citta.

The cittas have five processes (vṛtti),

1. pramāṇa^[1] (valid cognitive states such as are generated by perception, inference and scriptural testimony),
2. viparyaya (false knowledge, illusion, etc.),
3. vikalpa (abstraction, construction and different kinds of imagination),
4. nidrā (sleep, is a vacant state of mind, in which tamas tends to predominate),
5. smṛti (memory).

These states of mind (vṛtti) comprise our inner experience. When they lead us towards saṃsāra into the course of passions and their satisfactions, they are said to be kliṣṭa (afflicted or leading to affliction); when they lead us towards liberation, they are called akliṣṭa (unafflicted). To whichever side we go, towards saṃsāra or towards mukti, we have to make use of our states of mind; the states which are bad often alternate with good states, and whichever state should tend towards our final good (liberation) must be regarded as good.

This draws attention to that important characteristic of citta, that it sometimes tends towards good (i.e. liberation) and sometimes towards bad (saṃsāra). It is like a river, as the Vyāsabhāṣya says, which flows both ways, towards sin and towards the good. The teleology of prakṛti requires that it should produce in man the saṃsāra as well as the liberation tendency.

Thus in accordance with it in the midst of many bad thoughts and bad habits there come good moral will and good thoughts, and in the midst of good thoughts and habits come also bad thoughts and vicious tendencies. The will to be good is therefore never lost in man, as it is an innate tendency in him which is as strong as his desire to enjoy pleasures. This point is rather remarkable, for it gives us the key of Yoga ethics and shows that our desire of liberation is not actuated by any hedonistic attraction for happiness or even removal of pain, but by an innate tendency of the mind to follow the path of liberation^[2]. Removal of pains is of course the concomitant effect of following such a course, but still the motive to follow this path is a natural and irresistible tendency of the mind. Man has power (śakti) stored up in his citta, and he has to use it in such a way that this tendency may gradually grow stronger and stronger and ultimately uproot the other. He must succeed in this, since prakṛti wants liberation for her final realization^[3].

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

 Sāṃkhya holds that both validity and invalidity of any cognition depend upon the cognitive state itself and not on correspondence with external facts or objects (svatah prāmānyam svatah aprāmāṇyam). The contribution of Sāṃkhya to the doctrine of inference is not definitely known. What little Vācaspati says on the subject has been borrowed from Vātsyāyana such as the pūivavat, śeṣavat and sāmānyatodṛṣṭa types of inference, and these may better be consulted in our chapter on Nyāya or in the Tātparyaṭīkā of Vācaspati. Sāṃkhya inference was probably from particular to particular on the ground of seven kinds of relations according to which they had seven kinds of inference “mātrānimittasamyogivirodhisahacāribhiḥ. Svasvāmibadhyaghātādyaih sāmkhyānāṃ saptadhānumā” (Tātparyaṭīkā, p. 109). Sāṃkhya definition of inference as given by Udyotakara (I. I. v) is “sambandhādekasmāt pratyakṣāccheṣasiddhiranumānam.”

[2]:

Sāṃkhya however makes the absolute and complete destruction of three kinds of sorrows, ādhyātmika (generated internally by the illness of the body or the unsatisfied passions of the mind), ōdhibhautika (generated externally by the injuries inflicted by other men, beasts, etc.) and ādhidaivika (generated by the injuries inflicted by demons and ghosts) the object of all our endeavours (puruṣārtha).

[3]:

See my “Yoga Psychology Quest,” October, 1921.