Pradhana

Pradhāna (Sanskrit: प्रधान) is an adjective meaning – most important, prime, chief or major. The Shatapatha Brahmana (शतपथ ब्राह्मण) gives its meaning as – 'the chief cause of the material nature' (S.B.7.15.27) or 'the creative principle of nature' (S.B.10.85.3). The Samkhya School of Indian philosophy employs the word, Pradhana, to mean the creative principle of nature, as the original root of matter, the Prime Matter but which according to Badarayana’s logic is the unintelligent principle which cannot be the one consisting of bliss.

Kapila introduces the concept of Pradhana, the matter from which the world has been created. According to the Samkhya School, Pradhana is the original root of matter defined as the state of equilibrium of the three Gunas – Sattva, Rajas and Tamas, the three modes of Prakrti ('material nature'). Prakrti is eternal and all-pervading, unlimited and the material cause, eternally producing everything but insentient. Purusha is unproduced, free from all action and modification, without attributes, all-pervading consciousness, individual and separate for each body. Pradhana is called anumanam, 'the inferred entity', meaning purely hypothetical, which when manifest becomes the efficient and the material cause of creation.

Rishi Madhucchanda tells us (Rig Veda I.ii.5) that –

the entire Solar system and all those forces supporting it which are themselves supported by the Creator render all created objects visible i.e. known, to all living beings who in their turn are drawn towards those very objects. This means that all objects whether living or not living, moving or not movjng, act, interact and co-act in accordance with their respective qualities and tendencies, and become involved in works, which is so because the Creator having created all this entered into the created as the efficient and material cause of creation; the created is the whole universe of objects. And, Rishi Vishwakarma Bhovana informs (Rig Veda X.82.5) that –

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