Buddhi (Sanskrit: बुद्धि) refers to the intellectual faculty and the power to "form and retain concepts, reason, discern, judge, comprehend, understand".[1][2]
Buddhi (Sanskrit: बुद्धि) is derived from the Vedic Sanskrit root Budh (बुध् ), which literally means "to wake, be awake, observe, heed, attend, learn, become aware of, to know, be conscious again".[1] The term appears extensively in Rigveda and other Vedic literature.[1]Buddhi means, states Monier Williams, the power to "form, retain concepts; intelligence, reason, intellect, mind", the intellectual faculty and the ability to "discern, judge, comprehend, understand" something.[1][3]
InSankhya and yogic philosophy both the mind and the ego are forms in the realm of nature (prakriti) that have emerged into materiality as a function of the three gunas (ग़ुण) through a misapprehension of purusha (पुरूष) (the consciousness-essence of the jivatman). Discriminative in nature (बुद्धि निश्चयात्मिका चित्त-वृत्ति), buddhi is that which is able to discern truth (satya) from falsehood and thereby to make wisdom possible.[citation needed]
According to the Sānkhya-Yoga view, buddhi is in essence unconscious, and as such, cannot be an object of its own consciousness. This means that it can neither apprehend an object nor manifest itself.[5]
In the Yoga Sutra, it is explained that the buddhi cannot illuminate itself, since it itself is the object of sight, "na tat svhāsam draśhyatvāt".[6]
