The Nature of Substance (Dravya)

Dravya (Substance) is the first and foremost category among the seven categories. Dravya is the only category which has an independent existence. Karma, guṇa and sāmānaya subsist in substance. Viśeṣa inheres in an eternal substance. Similarly samavāya also exists in it. Therefore, substance is the substratum of all other categories. Substance is also the inherent cause of guṇa and karma. Hence, substance is regarded as the primary or the first category.^[1]

Quality and action exist in substance. Quality or action cannot subsist in itself. Quality permanently inheres in substance, but action is temporary and dynamic. A book is a substance and its colour, dimension etc. are quality and book’s motion is action.^[2]

According to Buddhists, substance is the combination of qualities and actions. But the Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika system does not accept this opinion. This system states that dravya is different from qualities and actions and it has a real, selfexistence.^[3] If there is no difference between substance and quality or action, then it cannot be the substratum of them. Qualities and actions have not self-existence and they inhere in substance. There is inherent relation between a substance and qualities or actions. It is stated that substance is the inherent cause of its effect. This nature differentiator the substance from a quality and an action.

When a substance is produced, at that moment quality and action are not in it. If quality arises with substance at the same time, then there is no difference between them. But at the next moment substance obtains them. Dravya possesses of qualities or actions when it is possessed of prior non-existence or posterior nonexistence of qualities or actions. Substance is the material cause of its effect at any time, past, present and future.^[4]

Kaṇāda defines dravya as that which is an entity, which possesses qualities and actions and which is the inherent cause.^[5]

In this definition there are actually three definition, viz.

1. kriyāvattvaṃ dravyatvaṃ,
2. guṇavattvaṃ dravyatvaṃ,
3. samavāyikāraṇat-vaṃ dravyatvaṃ.

The first definition, i.e. kriyāvattvaṃ dravyatvaṃ is non-pervasive (avyāpta) to the substances like ākaśa, kāla, dik, ātmā which are devoid of action being vibhudravyas. Hence, this definition is defective. The second definition guṇavattvaṃ dravyatvaṃ is also non-pervasive to the substances in the first moment of production. Because it is qualityless at the first moment. It is postulated by the Nyāya-Vaiśeṣikas that at the moment of production of a substance, it remains qualityless. Qualities are produced at the next moment from the substances. If it is accepted that qualities arise at the same time with the substance, there will be no difference between them. Hence, it is said utpattikālīnāṃ dravyaṃ kṣanamaguṇaṃ tiṣṭhati (i.e. substance remains without quality for one moment at the time of production). The third definition is accepted by all. It is found in Muktāvaī, Tarkabhāṣā, etc. Praśastapāda also agrees to it.^[6] In the Tarkabhāṣā, the substance is defined as that which is a samavāyikāraṇa (inherent cause) or in which qualities subsist.^[7] Śivāditya states about dravya in his Saptapadārthī that a substance is that in which has the generality of substanceness, qualities in inherent relation and what is itself an intimate or inherent cause.^[8]

Annaṃbhaṭṭa does not define dravya in his Tarkasaṃgraha. But he gives the definition of dravya in his commentary, Dīpikā as dravyatvajātimatvaṃ guṇavatvaṃ vā dravyasāmānyalakṣaṇam^[9] i.e., substance is that which possesses the universal of dravyatva or which possesses quality Siddhānta–Candrodaya, a commentary on Tarkasaṃgraha and Tarkakaumudī also give the support this definition of dravya.

Now Annaṃbhaṭṭa himself argues that guṇavattva cannot be a definition of substance, since it is non-pervasive to the substance at the time of production and to the substance which has been destroyed just after its production.^[10] He then proceeds to show that this contention is not tenable. Because the actual purport of the objective guṇavattva is not the ‘substratum of quality’. He says that guṇavattva implies a thing possessing an universal (jāti) other than sattā and is co-existent with a quality.^[11] This ultimately leads to the first definition of substance given by Annaṃbhaṭṭa, i.e., possessing dravyatvajāti.

From the above discussion it may be stated that samavāyikāraṇatvaṃ dravyatvaṃ is only faultless definition of dravya. This definition is free from the all doṣas, ativyāpti, avyāpti and asambhava. In the Siddhānta-Candrodaya, Śrīkṛṣṇa Dhūrjyoti tries to define it that dravyatvajāti is independently proved through perception or inference.^[12]

Radhakrishnan states:

“The Vaiśeṣika is anxious to assert the existence of something which has qualities without being itself a quality, for we predicate qualities of substances and not qualities of qualities. Nor can it be said that we predicate one quality of a group of qualities. But since a substance cannot be conceived apart from qualities, it is defined as possessing qualities.”^[13]

There is difference between eternal and non-eternal substances. The eternal substances are not caused and not destroyed. On the other hand non-eternal substances are caused and destroyed. The atoms of earth, water, fire and air as also ether, time, self and mind are eternal substances.^[14]

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

ādau dravyasyoddeśaḥ sarvāśrayatvena prādhānyāt. Vaiśeṣikadarśanam with Praśastapādabhāṣya, p. 7; dravyasya sarvapadārthādhāratvena samavāyikāraṇatvena ca prādhānyāt prathamamuddeśaḥ. Mitabhāṣiṇī on Saptapadārthī, pp. 14-15

[2]:

Sinha, J.N., Indian Philosophy, Vol. I, p. 340

[3]:

Bhattacharjya, Jyotsna, Bharatiya Darsana. p.180

[4]:

Vaiśeṣikasūtropaskāra, 1.1.5

[5]:

kriyāguṇavat samavāyīkāraṇamiti dravyalakṣaṇam. Vaiśeṣikasūtra, 1.1.15

[6]:

Vide., Nyāyadarśanavimarṣa, p.12

[7]:

tatra samavāyikāraṇaṃ dravyaṃ guṇāśrayo vā dravyam. Tarkabhāṣā, 306

[8]:

dravyatvasāmānyayogi guṇavat samavāyikāraṇaṃ ceti. Saptapadārthī, p. 48

[9]:

Tarkasaṃgraha, p.4

[10]:

nanu guṇavattvaṃ na dravyasāmānyalakṣaṇam, ādyakṣaṇāvacchinnaghaṭe utpannavinaṣṭaghaṭe cāvyāptiriti cet, na. Dīpikā on Tarkasaṃgraha, p.4

[11]:

guṇasamānādhikaraṇasattābhinnajātimatvasya vivakṣitatvāt. Ibid

[12]:

Vide., Tarkasaṃgraha, p.77

[13]:

Radhakrishnan, S., Indian Philosophy, Vol. I, pp. 168-169

[14]:

Ibid., p.169