Note 45 — Chapter XV · MATTER AND MIND

Avidyā manifests itself in different forms: (1) as the afflictions (kleśa) of asmitā (egoism), rāga (attachment), dvesha (antipathy) and abhiniveśa (self-love); (2) as doubt and intellectual error; (3) as error of sense. All these manifestations of avidyā are also the different forms of viparyyaya or bhrama (error, illusion, mistake). This bhrama in Yoga is the thinking of something as that which it is not (anyathākhyāti). Thus we think the miserable worldly existence as pleasurable and attribute the characteristics of prakṛti to purusha and vice versa. All afflictions are due to this confusion and misjudgment, the roots of which stay in the buddhis in all their transmigrations from one life to another. Sāṃkhya, however, differs from Yoga and thinks that all error (avidyā or bhrama) is due only to non-distinction between the true and the untrue. Thus non-distinction (aviveka) between prakṛti and purusha is the cause of all our miserable mundane existence. Avidyā and aviveka are thus synonymous with Sāṃkhya.