Mokshadharma Parva — The difference between Sankhya and Yoga systems of philosophy

Yudhishthira said You should explain to me, O sire, what the difference is between the Sankhya and the Yoga systems of philosophy. O foremost one of Kuru's race, you know everything is known, O you who are conversant with all duties.

Bhishma said The followers of Sankhya praise the Sankhya system and the Yogins praise the Yoga system. For fixing the superiority of their respective systems, each calls his own system to be better.

Wise men devoted to Yoga point out proper and very good reasons, O crusher of enemies, for showing that one who does not believe in the existence of God cannot acquire Liberation.

Those twice-born ones, again, who are believers in the Sankhya doctrines forward good reasons for showing that a person by acquiring true knowledge of all objects, becomes dissociated from all earthly objects, and, after death, it is plain, becomes liberated and that it cannot be otherwise. Men of great wisdom have thus expounded the Sankhya philosophy of Liberation.

When reasons are thus equally placed on both sides, those are assigned on that side which one is otherwise inclined to follow as one's own, should be accepted. Indeed, those words that are said on that side should be considered as wholesome. Good men may be found on both sides. Persons like you may adot either opinion.

The evidences of Yoga are addressed to the direct perception of the senses; those of Sankhya are based on the scriptures. Both I systems of philosophy are approved by me, O Yudhishthira.

agree with noth those systems of science, O king, so do the good and wise. If practised duly according to the instructions laid down, both would, O king, make a person acquire the highest end. In both systems purity is equally recommended as also mercy towards all creatures, O sinless one. In both, again, the observance of vows has been equally sanctioned. Only the scriptures which point out their paths are different.

Yudhishthira said If the vows, the purity, the mercy, and the fruits thereof recommended in both systems be the same, tell me, O grandfather, why then are not their scriptures the same?

Bhishma said By renouncing through the help of Yoga, these five faults, viz., attachment carelessness, affection, lust and anger one acquires Liberation.

As large fishes, breaking through the net pass into their own element, similarly, Yogins, become purged of all sins and acquire the happiness of Liberation.

As powerful animals breaking through the nets in which hunters catch them, enjoy the men happiness of freedom, so Yogins freed from all fetters, attain to the pure path that leads of Liberation.

Truly, O king, breaking through the fetter born of cupidity, Yogins, gifted with strength acquire the sinless and auspicious and high path of Liberation.

Feeble animals, O king, entangled in nets, are, forsooth, destroyed. Such is the case with persons shorn of Yoga power.

As weak fishes, O son of Kunti, fallen into the net, become entangled in it, so, O king, shorn of Yoga power meet with destruction.

As birds, O chastiser of enemies, when entangled in the fine nets of fowlers, meet with their destruction, but if they are strong effect their escape, similarly, it is the case with Yogins, O chastiser of enemies, fettered by the bonds of action, they that are weak meet with destruction, while they who are strong break through them.

A small and weak fire, O king, is put out when large logs of timber are placed upon it. So the Yogin who is weak, O king, encounters ruin.

The same fire, however, O king, when it becomes strong, would burn with the help of the wind the entire Earth.

Similarly, the Yogin when grown in strength, burning with energy, and endued with power is capable of scorching the entire Universe like the Sun that rises at the time of the universal dissolution.

As a weak man, O king, is carried away by a current, so is a weak Yogin helplessly carried away by objects of the senses.

An elephant withstands a powerful current Similarly. a Yogin, having acquired Yogapower withstands all objects of the senses.

Independent of all things, Yogins, gifted with Yoga-power and other lordly powers enter into the very lords of creation, the Rishis, the gods, and the great Beings in the universe.

Neither Yama, nor the Destroyer, nor Death, himself of terrible power, when irate, ever succeeds in lording over the Yogin, O king, who is gifted with immeasurable energy.

The Yogin, acquiring Yoga-power, can create thousands of bodies and with them walks over the Earth.

Some amongst them enjoy objects of the and again practise the austerest penances, and once again, like the Sun withdraw themselves from such penances. senses

The Yogin, who is gifted with strength and whom fetters bind not, certainly succeeds in acquiring Liberation.

I have now described to you, O king, on all these powers of Yoga. I shall once more tell you what the subtile powers of Yoga are with their marks.

Hear, O chief of Bharata's race, the subtile marks of the meditation and the concentration of the Soul.

As a bowman who is careful and attentive succeeds in striking the aim, so the Yogin with absorbed soul, forsooth, acquires Liberation.

As a man, fixing his mind on a vessel full of some liquid carefully ascends a flight of steps, so the Yogin, fixed and absorbed in his soul, purifies it and marks it as effulgent as the Sun.

As a boat, O son of Kunti, who is tossed on the bosom of the sea is very soon taken by a careful boatman to the other shore, so the man of knowledge by fixing his soul in concentration, acquires Liberation, which is so difficult to acquire, after renouncing his body, O king.

As a careful charioteer, O king, having yoked good horses takes the car warrior to where he likes, even so the Yogin, O king, careful in concentration, soon attains to the highest spot like an arrow shot off the bow reaching the object aimed at.

The Yogin who stay immovably after having entered his self into the soul, dissipates his sins and gets at that indestructible spot which is the possession of those who are pious.

That Yogin who, carefully practises high vows, properly unites, O king, his sentiency with the self Soul in the navel, the throat, the head, the heart, the chest, the sides, the eye, the ear, and the nose, burns all his mountain-like acts good and bad, and having recourse to excellent Yoga acquires Liberation.

Yudhishthira said You should tell me, O grandfather, what the kinds of diet are by taking which, and what the things are by conquering which, the Yogin, O Bharata, gains Yoga-power.

Engaged, O Bharata, in subsisting upon broken grains of rice and sodden cakes of sesame, and abstaining from oil and butter, the Yogin gains Yoga-power.

By subsisting for a long time on powdered barely unmixed with any liquid, and by taking only one meal a day, the Yogin, of purified soul gains Yoga-power.

By drinking only water mixed with milk, first only once during the day, then once during a fortnight, then once during a month, then once during three months, and then once during a whole year, the Yogin gains Yogapower.

By abstaining entirely from meat, О king, the Yogin of purified soul acquires power.

By subjugating lust, and anger, and heat, and cold and rain, and fear, and anger, and heat, and cold and rain, and fear, and grief, and the breath, and all sounds that are agreeable to inen, and objects of the senses, and the uneasiness, so difficult to conquer, that is uneasiness, so difficult to conquer, that is created by abstention from sexual connection, and thirst which is so terrible, O king, and the pleasures of touch and sleep, and procrastination that is almost unconquerable, O be. of kings, great Yogins, shorn of attachments and endued with great wisdom, helped by their understanding, and equipt with wealth of contemplation and study, cause the subtile soul to stand in all its glory.

This high path of learned Brahmanas is highly difficult to tread. No one can walk along this path with ease.

That path is like a dreadful forest which is full of numberless snakes and crawling vermin, with pits everywhere, without water for satisfying one's thirst, and full of thorns, and inaccessible on that account.

Indeed, the path of Yoga is like a road along which no food is available, which runs through a desert having all its trees burnt down in a fire, and which is unsafe for being infested with bands of robbers. Very few young men can pass safely through it.

Like such a path few Brahmanas can walk along the Yoga-path with ease and comfort. That man who, having followed this path, ceases to go forward is considered as guilty of many faults.

Men of purified souls, O king, can stay with ease upon Yoga-contemplation which is like the sharp edge of razor. Persons of impure souls, however, cannot stay on it.

When Yoga-contemplation is disturbed or. otherwise obstructed, it can never take the Yogin to an auspicious and even as a vessel which is without a captain cannot take the passengers to the other shore.

That man, O son of Kunti, who practises Yoga-contemplation according to due rites succeeds in renouncing off both birth and death, and happiness and sorrow.

All this that I have told you has been stated in the various treatises on Yoga. The highest fruits of Yoga are seen in persons of the twiceborn order.

That highest fruit is oneness with Brahma. The great Yogin, endued with greatness, can enter into, and come out of, at his will, Brahman himself who is the lord of all gods, and the born-giving Vishnu, and Bhava, and Dharma, and the six-faced Kartikeya, and the (spiritual) sons of Brahman, the quality of Darkness that is productive of much pain, and that of Ignorance, and that of Goodness which is pure, and Nature which is the highest, and the goddess Siddhi who is the wife of Varuna, and all sorts of energy, and all-enduring patience, and the bright lord of stars in the sky with the stars twinkling all around, and the Vishvas, and the snakes, and the Pitris, and all the mountains and hills, and the great and terrible oceans, and all the rivers, and the clouds charged with rain and serpents, and trees, and Yakshas, and the cardinal and subsidiary points of the horizon, and the Gandharvas, and all male persons and all female ones also.

This topic, "O king, about the Supreme Being of mighty energy should be considered as auspicious.” The Yogin has Narayana for his soul. Lording over all things, the great Yogin is capable of creating all things.