By body
By body, from fewest to most: moving beings, fire-bodies, earth-bodies, water-bodies, air-bodies, plant-bodies.
By kind of body: the moving beings, everything with two senses or more, are fewest. Fire-bodies are innumerably more; earth-bodies a little more than fire; water-bodies a little more than earth; air-bodies a little more than water; and plant-bodies infinitely more than air. So among the four elements the text ranks fire lowest and air highest, and it is the plants, with the nigoda among them, that hold almost everything alive.
In the text's own words the ladder reads - fewest: moving beings; innumerably many times more: fire-bodies; a little more: earth-bodies; a little more: water-bodies; a little more: air-bodies; infinitely many times more: plant-bodies. Source: Prajñāpanā 3.
माप और संख्याएँ
| Fewest | moving beings |
|---|---|
| asaṃkhyāta-guṇa | fire-bodies |
| viśeṣādhika | earth-bodies |
| viśeṣādhika | water-bodies |
| viśeṣādhika | air-bodies |
| ananta-guṇa | plant-bodies |