The six marks
One gāthā gives the test: hidden veins, hidden joints, hidden nodes, an even break, no fibre in the break, growth again when cut - a common body; the reverse of each, a body of its own.
Gūḍha-sira-sandhi-pavvaṃ samabhaṅgam ahīruhaṃ ca chinna-ruhaṃ, sāhāraṇaṃ sarīraṃ, tavvivarīyaṃ tu patteyaṃ. The Jīvavicāra has it as its twelfth verse and the Prajñāpanā has the same words. It is a field test, and the view draws it as one: a stalk beside a tuber. The stalk shows its veins and its joints and its nodes, snaps unevenly, leaves threads in the break, and dies when cut; the tuber shows none of these, breaks like a lump of clay, and put back in the ground grows again.
The last mark is the one the list is built on. What grows again from a piece has no single body to lose, which is what a common body means. The thirty-two are the plants the tradition found the marks in; the marks are given so that a plant not on the list can be judged, and the Jīvavicāra's own list, in its ninth and tenth verses, is shorter and more general - roots, sprouts, shoots, mould, moss, mushrooms, the three gingers, every tender fruit, every leaf with its veins hidden.
माप और संख्याएँ
| Source | Jīvavicāra 12 · Prajñāpanā |
|---|---|
| The marks | 6 |
| Common body | all six present |
| A body of its own | the reverse |