The sixfold wealth
What is the sixfold wealth that begins with calm? Calm, restraint, withdrawal, endurance, faith, and steadiness. These six.
What is the wealth of the six, beginning with śama? They are śama (calm), dama (restraint), uparama (withdrawal), titikṣā (endurance), śraddhā (faith), and samādhāna (steadiness of mind).
- ṣaṭka-sampatti
Śama and dama are named first among the six. What does the difference between them point to?
- Śama quiets the mind itself, while dama reins in the outer senses so they stop pulling the mind outward
- Śama and dama are two words for the same control of the senses
- Śama is for beginners and dama for advanced seekers
- Śama gives liberation directly, while dama only prepares for it
Show the answer
Six disciplines, counted as wealth
The third of the four means gathers six disciplines of the inner instrument and calls them a wealth, a sampatti: not goods to be had but powers to be grown, the equipment the mind needs before truth can be discerned. The first two divide the field. Śama is the stilling of the mind itself, the settling of its own restlessness; dama is the reining in of the outer senses, the eye and the rest, so they no longer drag the mind outward. These are counted as the same kind of riches as gold, and the word means it: a quiet mind is the one possession inquiry cannot proceed without.
Uparama, titikṣā, śraddhā, and samādhāna carry the gathering further. Uparama this primer glosses as the steady keeping of one's own duty, svadharma; the wider tradition also hears in it uparati, the turning away from what is not one's work. Titikṣā is the bearing of cold and heat, pleasure and pain, without being thrown by them. Śraddhā is trust in the words of the guru and of Vedanta, the confidence that lets the teaching be received before it is verified. Samadhana is the gathering of the mind to a single point, its readiness to stay with the inquiry rather than wander.
These six do not give liberation; they make the seeker fit to seek. Discernment of the lasting from the unlasting has already been named, and dispassion toward enjoyments here and hereafter; now the mind that holds those two is asked to become calm, restrained, steady, patient, trusting, and one-pointed. The wealth is inner because the work is inner: nothing here is added to the Self, everything here readies the one who would know it. A mind so gathered is a mind that can hold the discerning of truth.
Which of the six does your own mind already hold, and which is the one it most needs grown?
In the commentaries
The third of the four means is named here as a wealth, a sampatti: not goods to be had but six powers of the inner instrument to be grown, the equipment the mind needs before truth can be discerned. The first two divide the field cleanly. Śama is the stilling of the mind itself, the quieting of its own restlessness; dama is the reining in of the outer senses, the eye and the rest, so they no longer drag the mind outward. Uparama this primer glosses as the steady keeping of one's own duty, while the living tradition also hears in it uparati, the turning away from what is not one's work; titikṣā is the bearing of the pairs, cold and heat, pleasure and pain, without being thrown; śraddhā is trust in the words of the guru and of Vedanta that lets the teaching be received before it is verified; samādhāna is the gathering of the mind to a single point, its readiness to stay with the inquiry. None of these gives liberation. Together they make the seeker fit to seek, refining the mind into an instrument that can hold the discerning of truth.