Vairāgya
Vairāgya (वैराग्य) — From vi + rāga — "beyond passion, dispassion." Vairāgya is the quality of non-attachment — not indifference to the world, but freedom from compulsive craving for it. Patañjali defines it (Yoga Sutras 1.15) as the "consciousness of mastery" — the state of one who has ceased to thirst for objects seen or heard of. Śaṅkara pairs it directly with viveka as the two foundational qualifications for Vedāntic study: one must be able to discern the real from the unreal, and be sufficiently disenchanted with the unreal to pursue the real.
In Brief
- From vi + rāga — "beyond passion, dispassion." Vairāgya is the quality of non-attachment — not indifference to the world, but freedom from compulsive craving for it. Patañjali defines it (Yoga Sutras 1.15) as the "consciousness of mastery" — the state of one who has ceased to thirst for objects seen or heard of. Śaṅkara pairs it directly with viveka as the two foundational qualifications for Vedāntic study: one must be able to discern the real from the unreal, and be sufficiently disenchanted with the unreal to pursue the real.
From vi + rāga — "beyond passion, dispassion." Vairāgya is the quality of non-attachment — not indifference to the world, but freedom from compulsive craving for it. Patañjali defines it (Yoga Sutras 1.15) as the "consciousness of mastery" — the state of one who has ceased to thirst for objects seen or heard of. Śaṅkara pairs it directly with viveka as the two foundational qualifications for Vedāntic study: one must be able to discern the real from the unreal, and be sufficiently disenchanted with the unreal to pursue the real.