Buddhi

The deciding, discriminating function of the antahkarana — the intellect that resolves what the manas deliberates.

Overview

Buddhi is the decisive counterpart to the doubting manas. Where manas holds open questions, buddhi closes them: it concludes, it chooses, it forms conviction. In Vedanta the buddhi is also the organ of viveka — discrimination — which at its highest is the discrimination between atman and anatman.

Buddhi is one of the four components of the antahkarana and thus part of the subtle body. It is not the atman, but it is the layer through which atman’s light becomes focused, intentional cognition. The Gita will return to buddhi repeatedly — most famously in buddhi-yoga, the discipline of acting from a steady, discriminating buddhi rather than from reactive manas.

Related concepts

• antahkarana — the whole inner apparatus
• manas — the deliberating counterpart
• chitta — memory
• ahamkara — the I-maker
• viveka — the buddhi’s highest operation

In the Gita

• 02-13-15 — part of what travels with the embodied one

Lecture evidence

• Ep. 4 [09:20]: Swami names manas, buddhi, chitta, ahamkara as the four functions of the inner instrument.