Hetupratyaya is the Sanskrit word for causes and conditions. Hetu is the primary cause. Pratyaya is the secondary condition or conditions pre-existing allowing primary causes to function. Hetu is the direct force from which the fruit (effect) arises, while Pratyaya is the indirect force. No phenomena can exist without suitable causes and conditions. This is what is meant by "Dharmas do not arise by themselves." For example, a soybean. The soybean is a seed, taken here as Hetu, the primary cause. Water, soil, sunlight, air and fertilizer are the necessary secondary conditions, Pratyaya. If these causes and conditions come together in an appropriate manner, then the seed can germinate, bloom and produce fruit. Thus the fruit arises from causes. If we store this soybean in a granary or place it on gravel, it will remain a seed. The seed cannot grow and bear fruit in the absence of the necessary external conditions. See Gassho.
The following are the generally accepted four-part breakdown of Pratyayas followed by their interrelationships (1) Aalambana Pratyaya (2) Samanantara Pratyaya (3) SahakAri Pratyaya and (4) Adipathi Pratyaya:
- (1) Aalambana Pratyaya relates to the objects , which are the causes of the cognitions in which , in the absence of those objects , can not come in to being .
- (2) Samanatara Pratyaya is a cognition that enables the succeding cognition to recieve the form of the external objects.
- (3) SahakAri Pratyaya refers to light etc. which are responsible in making the cognition distinct with regard to its object. The absence of light disables a person from having a clear apprehension of an object placed in the darkness.Therefore light is sahakAri (assistive).
- (4) Adhipathi Pratyaya refers to the sense organs . It is the sense organs that make the objects present their forms to the cognition in the succeeding moment .
As the external objects present their forms to cognition, so do the internal objects like pleasure, pain and hatred; thus they too become inferable. See Dharmadhatu.
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