Świetlista natura rzeczywistości

In this essay, I analyse the concept of reality presented as naturally luminous. Light is distinguished either as source or as reflected light, by adopting either a metaphysical or an epistemic perspective. The subsequent analyses are based on a further distinction between two dimensions of reality – the absolute and the relative. I attempt to show that these two dimensions of reality are consistently predicated using words derived from the following roots: as (to exist) and bhū (to arise, to be, to be active, to happen) and, further, that there is a close correlation between the light source and the absolute dimension as well as between reflected light and the presented reality. I limit myself to two schools – Advaita and Sankhya-yoga – because there the idea of luminosity is the most evident, since they use the technical term prakāśa (shining), for the absolute dimension of reality. In the Advaita system, there is also the distinction between the term jyotisha, used when talking about the nature of the absolute, and prakāśa, used to indicate how this absolute presents itself.