सांख्य [ sāṃkhya ] [ sāṃkhya ] m. f. n. ( fr. [ saṃ-khyā ] ) numeral , relating to number Lit. W.

relating to number (in gram. as expressed by the case-terminations ) Lit. Pat.

rational , or discriminative Lit. W.

[ sāṃkhya ] m. one who calculates or discriminates well , (esp.) an adherent of the Sāṃkhya doctrine Lit. CūlUp. Lit. MBh.

N. of a man Lit. Car.

patr. of the Vedic Ṛishi Atri Lit. Anukr.

N. of Śiva Lit. MBh.

n. (accord. to some also m.) N. of one of the three great divisions of Hindū philosophy (ascribed to the sage Kapila ( q.v. ) , and so called either from " discriminating " , in general , or , more probably , from " reckoning up " or " enumerating " twenty-five Tattvas ( see [ tattva ] ) or true entities ( twenty-three of which are evolved out of Prakṛiti " the primordial Essence " or " first-Producer " ) , viz. Buddhi , Ahaṃkāra , the five Tan-mātras , the five Mahā-bhūtas and Manas ; the twenty-fifth being Purusha or Spirit ( sometimes called Soul ) which is neither a Producer nor Production ( see [ vikāra ] ) , but wholly distinct from the twenty-four other Tattvas , and is multitudinous , each separate Purusha by its union with Prakṛiti causing a separate creation out of Prakṛiti , the object of the philosophy being to effect the final liberation of the Purusha or Spirit from the fetters caused by that creation ; the Yoga ( q.v. ) branch of the Sāṃkhya recognizes a Supreme Spirit dominating each separate Purusha ; the Tantras identify Prakṛiti with the wives of the gods , esp. with the wife of Śiva ; the oldest systematic exposition of the Sāṃkhya seems to have been by an author called Pañca-śikha ( the germ , however , being found in the Shashṭi-tantra , of which only scanty fragments are extant ) ; the original Sūtras were superseded by the Sāṃkhya-kārikā of Īśvara-kṛishṇa , the oldest manual on the Sāṃkhya system that has come down to us and probably written in the 5th century A.D. , while the Sāṃkhya-sūtras or Śiva-pravacana and Tattva-samāsa , ascribed to the sage Kapila , are now thought to belong to as late a date as the 14th or 15th century or perhaps a little later ) Lit. ŚvetUp. Lit. MBh. Lit. IW. 73 Lit. RTL.