Adhyāya 302: Guṇa-vicāra, Gati-bheda, and the Imperishable State
Yājñavalkya–Janaka
शुक्ललोहितकृष्णानि रूपाण्येतानि त्रीणि तु । सर्वाण्येतानि रूपाणि यानीह प्राकृतानि वै
śukla-lohita-kṛṣṇāni rūpāṇy etāni trīṇi tu | sarvāṇy etāni rūpāṇi yānīha prākṛtāni vai ||
အဖြူ၊ အနီ၊ အနက်—ဤသုံးရောင်သည် သုံးသဏ္ဌာန် (သုံးအရောင်) ဖြစ်၏။ ဤလောက၌ ပရကృతိမှ ပေါ်ထွန်းလာသော သဏ္ဌာန်အားလုံးသည် ဤသုံးရောင်အတွင်း၌ပင် ပါဝင်သည်။
वसिष्ठ उवाच
All material manifestations (prākṛta rūpas) can be understood through the threefold framework of guṇas—sattva (white/clarity), rajas (red/activity), and tamas (black/inertia). This provides an ethical lens for evaluating behavior and cultivating sattva.
In Śānti Parva’s instructional discourse, Vasiṣṭha explains a philosophical classification: the diversity of worldly forms and dispositions is traced back to Prakṛti operating through three primary qualities, expressed symbolically as white, red, and black.