Pakudha Kaccayana

Pakudha Kaccayana was an Indian teacher and philosopher who lived around the 6th century BCE, contemporaneous with Mahavira and the Buddha. He was an atomist who believed that everything was made of seven eternal elements – earth, water, fire, air, happiness, pain and soul. According to the Pali Canon, Kacayana was his family name and he is said to have belonged to a Baman Family (meaning followers of dharma). He was sometimes called Pakkudha Katiyana, or Kadhudha Katiyana. According to Pakudha, there are seven eternal "elements": Earth, Water, Fire, Air, Joy, Sorrow and Life. Pakudha further asserted that these elements do not interact with one another. The Samannaphala Sutta (DN 2) represents Pakudha's views as follows: '...'there are these seven substances — unmade, irreducible, uncreated, without a creator, barren, stable as a mountain-peak, standing firm like a pillar — that do not alter, do not change, do not interfere with one another, are incapable of causing one another pleasure, pain, or both pleasure and pain. Which seven? The earth-substance, the liquid-substance, the fire-substance, the wind-substance, pleasure, pain, and the soul as the seventh. These are the seven substances — unmade, irreducible, uncreated, without a creator, barren, stable as a mountain-peak, standing firm like a pillar — that do not alter, do not change, do not interfere with one another, and are incapable of causing one another pleasure, pain, or both pleasure and pain. 'And among them there is no killer nor one who causes killing, no hearer nor one who causes hearing, no cognizer nor one who causes cognition. When one cuts off [another person's] head, there is no one taking anyone's life. It is simply between the seven substances that the sword passes.' In the Brahmajala Sutta (DN 1), theories such as Pakudha's are labeled as "Atomic theory" (Pali/Skt.: anu vaada) and "eternalism" (sassatavādā). According to Buddhaghosa, he suffered from many obsessional rituals with regard to the use of water, avoiding the use of cold water and always using hot; when this was not available, he did not wash. If he crossed a stream he would consider this a sin, and would make expiation by constructing a mound of earth. He did not speak of God, the soul or the other world, which has led some scholars to class him as a materialist.