---
type: Concept
bundle: nyaya-vaisheshika
bundle_version: 0.9.0
id: ishvara
title: Īśvara (Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika)
iast: Īśvara
devanagari: ईश्वर
description: 'God as the intelligent efficient cause of the ordered world, established by inference: the omniscient eternal self who fashions the cosmos from beginningless atoms and karma; the Nyāya rational theism (Udayana''s proofs); NOT the material cause of the world, NOT the Advaita Brahman appearing as Īśvara, NOT the Yoga Īśvara (a special untouched puruṣa who is not creator).'
darshana:
- Nyāya
- Vaiśeṣika
school_scope: 'Nyāya''s Īśvara is an EFFICIENT cause inferred by argument (the world as effect needs an intelligent maker), distinct from: the Yoga Īśvara (yoga-darshana v0.2, a special puruṣa, object of devotion, not a creator), the Advaita Īśvara (saguṇa Brahman at the vyāvahārika level), and cosmological Īśvara (cosmology-creation v0.7). Four Īśvaras, one word.'
text_source: Nyāya Kusumāñjali (Udayana); Nyāya Sūtra 4.1.19-21
tags:
- ishvara
- god
- nyaya
- vaisheshika
- rational-theism
not:
- term: the material cause of the world
  why: Nyāya's Īśvara does not make the world out of himself; the material cause is the eternal atoms. Īśvara is the intelligent efficient cause who sets the eternal atoms in motion and orders their combination according to the beginningless karma of souls. He is the cosmic architect, not the cosmic substance. This is the reverse of any pantheism or of Brahman-as-material-cause.
  instead: Define the Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika Īśvara as the omniscient eternal self who, as efficient cause, arranges eternal atoms and dispenses the fruits of karma to fashion an ordered world; established by inference from the world's being a structured effect.
- term: the Advaita Brahman (Īśvara as saguṇa appearance)
  why: In Advaita, Īśvara is Brahman associated with māyā at the empirical level and is ultimately transcended in non-dual knowledge, and Brahman is both efficient and material cause. Nyāya's Īśvara is a really distinct eternal self, permanently real, and only the efficient cause. The metaphysics of cause and of ultimacy differ completely.
- term: the Yoga Īśvara (a special puruṣa)
  why: In Patañjali's Yoga, Īśvara is a distinct puruṣa untouched by affliction and action, an object of meditative devotion, and pointedly not the creator of the world. Nyāya's Īśvara is precisely a creator-orderer proved by causal inference. Same word, a different theological role.
related:
- /concepts/paramanu.md
- /concepts/atman.md
- /concepts/anumana.md
- /concepts/shabda.md
timestamp: '2026-07-02'
okf_version: '0.2'
license: CC BY-SA 4.0
---

# Īśvara (Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika) -- ईश्वर

**Not:** the material cause, the Advaita Brahman, the Yoga Ishvara

## What It Actually Means

Īśvara in Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika is God as the intelligent efficient cause of the world, and the school is famous for arguing the point rather than presupposing it. Udayana's Nyāyakusumāñjali marshals a battery of inferences, the best known being from the world as an effect: composite things (a sprout, a mountain) are effects and effects require an intelligent maker who knows the material, as a pot requires a potter; the vast ordered cosmos therefore requires an omniscient maker. Īśvara is himself an eternal self (a special ātman), never embodied, of eternal cognition and will, who does not create matter (the atoms are eternal) but sets it in motion and orders its combination in accordance with the beginningless karma of the many souls, dispensing their deserts. This is rational theism: God reached by the very inferential apparatus the bundle leads with, not by revelation alone. The concept must be held apart from at least three other Īśvaras in the corpus, the Yoga special-puruṣa, the Advaita saguṇa-Brahman, and the Purāṇic cosmological Īśvara, since the word is shared but the causal and metaphysical role differs in each.

## Audience Metaphor

Some traditions' God is the clay and the pot and the potter all at once. Nyāya's God is strictly the potter: the clay (the eternal atoms) was always there, and the karma of souls is the order-sheet, but it takes an omniscient craftsman to shape the raw eternal stuff into this cosmos. And unlike most theologies, Nyāya does not ask you to take the craftsman on faith; it hands you the argument, the world is a made thing, so it had a maker, and dares you to refute it.

## Citations

1. Udayana, Nyāyakusumāñjali (the classic inferential theism) -- see [references/nyayakusumanjali.md](../references/nyayakusumanjali.md)
2. Nyāya Sūtra 4.1.19-21 with Vātsyāyana's Bhāṣya -- see [references/nyaya-sutra.md](../references/nyaya-sutra.md)
3. Cross-bundle warning: Yoga Īśvara (yoga-darshana v0.2) and cosmological Īśvara (cosmology-creation v0.7) -- distinct roles
