Sūtra 1.1.7 (Enumeration of Actions)

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration, Word-for-word and English translation of Vaiśeṣika sūtra 1.1.7:

उत्क्षेपणमवक्षेपणं आकुञ्चनं प्रसारणं गमनमिति कर्माणि ॥ १.१.७ ॥

utkṣepaṇamavakṣepaṇaṃ ākuñcanaṃ prasāraṇaṃ gamanamiti karmāṇi || 1.1.7 ||

utkṣepaṇam—throwing upwards; avakṣepaṇam—throwing downwards; ākuñcanam—contraction; prasāraṇam—expansion; gamanam—going, motion; iti—namely; karmāṇi—actions.

7. Throwing upwards, Throwing downwards, Contraction Expansion, and Motion are Actions.

Commentary: The Upaskāra of Śaṅkara Miśra:

(English rendering of Śaṅkara Miśra’s commentary called Upaskāra from the 15th century)

Actions become the object of the sense by reason of their production by Substances and Attributes as well as of their Combination with Substances having colour. Therefore, immediately after the statement of Substances and Attributes, he states the enumeration and division of Actions.—[Read sūtra 1.1.7 above]

Throwing upwards, Throwing, downwards. Contraction, Expansion, and Motion are Actions. ‘Iti’ has the force of determination, as Rotation etc, are included in Motion. Here then there are five ‘classes’ directly pervaded by Action-ness, namely, the quality of throwing upwards, the quality of throwing downwards, the quality of contraction, the quality of expansion, and the quality of motion (or throwing-upward-ness,throwing-downwar d-ness, contraction-ness, expansion-ness.. and motion-ness).

Well, but this is disproved by the fat that Motion is a synonym of Action, because the consciousness of Going is experienced in all cases. The four classes, throwing-upward-ness, etc, which have the co-extension or common field of the absolute non-existence of each in the others, are not known to be co-existent; therefore the classes pervaded by Action-ness are only four. (To this objection we reply): It is true that Motion is another name for Action. But it is separately mentioned with the object of collecting under one word Rotation, Evacuation, Percolation, Flaming upward, Bending, Uplifting, etc; which produce different states of consciousness and are known by different names. Or Going-ness also is really a fifth class pervaded by Action-ness. So that the application of Motion to Rotation, Evacuation, etc., alone is primary and if there is the application of Going to throwing upwards, throwing downwards, etc., then it is secondary or analogous. The common property of the primary and analogous instances is only tin’s that they are the non-combinative causes (i.e., conditions) of Conjunction with and Disjunction from constantly changing places and directions, and this belongs to Rotation and others, so that by the inclusion of Going these too have been included.

The states of egress, ingress, etc. however, are not classes; for. in respect of one and the same Action, e.g., a person going from one room to another, one observer will have the consciousness, ‘he enters’; while another, ‘he comes out’; and thus there will result an intermixture of classes. So also in the case of Rotation, etc., on entering one watercourse after coming out by another, there will arise two states of consciousness, ‘he conies out’ and ‘he enters’; therefore these should be resolved into relativity in general.

In the case of throwing upwards, etc., however, the action of throwing upwards is caused in the hand by the volition produced by the desire ‘I throw up the pestle,’ through the non-combinative cause of conjunction with the soul exercising volition; then from the non-combi-native cause of motion [in?] the hand thrown up, there appears the action of throwing upwards in the pestle also; or, these two actions take place simultaneously. Then through the conjunction of the soul exercising volition produced by the desire to throw down the hand and pestle which have been thrown up, and also through the motion of the hand there is produced in the hand and the pestle simultaneously the action of throwing downwards favourable to tha [the?] fall of the pestle within rhe mortar. Then towards the sudden going upwards of the pestle after conjunction with a harder substance, neither desire nor volition is thecause, but the springing up of the pestle is due only to Re-action; and this is only going and not throwing upwards; the application of throwing upwards to it is only secondary. Similarly is the application of the name of Throwing upwards to two bodies of Air as well as to grass, cotton, etc., carried by them, going upwards by the force of the collision of two bodies of Air flowing in opposite directions. So also in the case of the going up of water under the collision of two currents. Thus the use of throwing upwards and throwing downwards is primary, only in the case of the body, its limbs and pestles, clubs, etc. in contact with them; for there are such perceptions as he throws up the pestle, he throws up the club; as also, he throws down.

Contraction is action which produces flexion in cloth and other things made up of parts and non-initial conjunctions of parts among themselves even while there exist the initial conjunctions of those parts; whence arise such perceptions as the lotus contracts, the cloth contracts, the leather contracts. Similarly, Expansion is action destructive of the non-initial conjunctions already produced, of parts; whence arise such perceptions as the cloth expands, the leather expands, the lotus expands. Actions which are different from these four are forms of Going. Therein Rotation is action, favorable to oblique conjunctions, appearing in the hand, from conjunction with soul exercising volition, and in the wheel, etc., from revolving and from conjunction called nodana (molecular motion) with the hand possessing Action. Evacuation, etc., should be similarly explained. He will also make them clear as he proceeds.

Now it should be understood that in the case of prescribed sacrifices, baths, gifts, etc., these Actions are the products of conjunction with the soul exercising volition favourable towards the production of Virtue; and in the case of going to a forbidden place, slaughter, eating tobacco, etc., they are the products of conjunction with the soul exercising volition tending towards the production of Vice.—7