---
type: Concept
bundle: sankhya-darshana
bundle_version: 0.13.0
id: parinamavada
title: Pariṇāmavāda
iast: Pariṇāmavāda
devanagari: परिणामवाद
description: 'The specific mechanism by which satkaryavada operates: real transformation of the cause into the effect (not mere appearance) -- distinguished from Advaita Vedanta''s vivartavada (v0.3), where the effect is an apparent, not a real, transformation of the cause.'
darshana:
- Samkhya
tags:
- parinamavada
- transformation
- samkhya
- causation
not:
- term: illusory appearance / vivartavada (Advaita Vedanta, v0.3)
  why: 'Advaita''s vivartavada holds that the manifest world is an apparent transformation of Brahman that never actually alters Brahman''s real nature (like a rope mistaken for a snake). Samkhya''s parinamavada is a doctrine of REAL transformation: prakriti genuinely and actually becomes the manifest world; the change is not a superimposed illusion to be corrected by knowledge alone.'
  instead: 'Contrast explicitly: Samkhya parinamavada = real, actual transformation of prakriti; Advaita vivartavada (v0.3) = merely apparent transformation, the underlying reality (Brahman) never actually changes.'
related:
- /concepts/satkaryavada.md
- /concepts/prakriti.md
timestamp: '2026-07-10'
okf_version: '0.2'
license: CC BY-SA 4.0
---

# Pariṇāmavāda -- परिणामवाद

**Not:** illusory appearance / vivartavada (Advaita Vedanta, v0.3)

## What It Actually Means

Pariṇāmavāda is the transformation-model of satkāryavāda: the cause really becomes the effect, the way milk really becomes curd. Nothing is added from outside and the change is not a trick of perception -- prakṛti's guṇa-equilibrium genuinely reorganizes into the manifest tattvas. This is what keeps Sāṃkhya's causal realism intact: the world is not a dream to be dispelled by insight alone, it is prakṛti's own actual unfolding, even though liberation still depends on puruṣa recognizing its distinctness from that unfolding.

## Audience Metaphor

Pariṇāma is like ice becoming water: a real, physical transformation, not a costume change. Compare this to Advaita's vivarta, closer to a rope in dim light briefly looking like a snake -- the rope never truly became a snake at all.

## Citations

1. Samkhya-Karika 9, 16 -- see [references/samkhya-karika.md](../references/samkhya-karika.md)
2. Cross-bundle warning: vivartavada in vedanta-epistemology v0.3 -- the contrasting apparent-transformation model, never a synonym
