presentment of him but a process of manifestation or of evolution starting from him.[784] It is not precisely evolution in the European sense, but rather a rhythmic movement, of duration and extent inexpressible in figures, in which the Supreme Spirit alternately emits and reabsorbs the universe.  As a rule the higher religious life aims at some form of union or close association with the deity, beyond the sphere of this process.  In the evolutionary process the Vaishnavas interpolate between the Supreme Spirit and the phenomenal world the phases of conditioned spirit known as Sankarshana, etc.; in the same way the Sivaite schools increase the twenty-four tattvas of the Sankhya to thirty-six.[785] The first of these tattvas or principles is Siva, corresponding to the highest Brahman.  The next phase is Sadasiva in which differentiation commences owing to the movement of Sakti, the active or female principle.  Siva in this phase is thought of as having a body composed of mantras.  Sakti, also known as Bindu or Suddhamaya, is sometimes regarded as a separate tattva but more generally as inseparably united with Siva.  The third tattva is Isvara, or Siva in the form of a lord or personal deity, and the fourth is Suddhavidya or true knowledge, explained as the principle of correlation between the experiencer and that which is experienced.  It is only after these that we come to Maya, meaning not so much illusion as the substratum in which Karma inheres or the protoplasm from which all things grow.  Between Maya and Purusha come five more tattvas, called envelopes.  Their effect is to enclose and limit, thus turning the divine spirit into a human soul.

Saktist accounts of the evolutionary process give greater prominence to the part played by Sakti and are usually metaphysiological, if the word may be pardoned, inasmuch as they regard the cosmic process as the growth of an embryo, an idea which is as old as the Vedas.[786] It is impossible to describe even in outline these manifold cosmologies but they generally speak of Sakti, who in one sense is identical with Siva and merely his active form but in another sense is identified with Prakriti, coming into contact with the form of Siva called Prakasa or light and then solidifying into a drop (Bindu) or germ which divides.  At some point in this process arise Nada or sound, and Sabda-brahman, the sound-Brahman, which manifests itself in various energies and assumes in the human body the form of the mysterious coiled force called Kundalini.[787] Some of the older Vishnuite writings use similar language of Sakti, under the name of Lakshmi, but in the Visishtadvaita of Ramanuja and subsequent teachers there is little disposition to dwell on any feminine energy in discussing the process of evolution.