---
type: Concept
bundle: nyaya-vaisheshika
bundle_version: 0.9.0
id: panchavayava
title: Pañcāvayava
iast: Pañcāvayava
devanagari: पञ्चावयव
description: The five members in which a demonstrative inference is stated to another (pratijñā, hetu, udāharaṇa, upanaya, nigamana); the public form of inference-for-others; NOT a redundant, longer version of the three-term syllogism, NOT rhetorical padding, NOT a proof in symbolic logic.
darshana:
- Nyāya
text_source: Nyāya Sūtra 1.1.32-39
tags:
- panchavayava
- five-members
- syllogism
- nyaya
- avayava
not:
- term: a three-term syllogism with two redundant extra steps
  why: 'The extra members are not padding around an Aristotelian core. The udāharaṇa (example) is a load-bearing member: it states the vyāpti and anchors it to an actual case, which is exactly the epistemic grounding a formal syllogism omits. Delete it and the inference loses its warrant, not merely a step.'
  instead: 'Read the five members as one integrated act of demonstration: claim, reason, pervasion-with-example, application to the case, and conclusion, where the example does real epistemic work no syllogistic term performs.'
- term: rhetorical elaboration or oratory
  why: The five-membered form is inference-for-others (parārthānumāna), the disciplined public statement of a valid inference, governed by strict conditions on each member, not persuasive ornament. Its aim is to make knowledge transferable, not to move an audience.
- term: a derivation in formal or symbolic logic
  why: Each member states a cognition about a specific subject (this hill, this smoke), not a schematic proposition. Rendering the form as a symbolic derivation drops the particular subject (pakṣa) and the example that Nyāya treats as essential.
related:
- /concepts/anumana.md
- /concepts/hetu.md
- /concepts/vyapti.md
- /concepts/shodasha-padartha.md
timestamp: '2026-07-02'
okf_version: '0.2'
license: CC BY-SA 4.0
---

# Pañcāvayava -- पञ्चावयव

**Not:** padded syllogism, rhetorical elaboration, symbolic derivation

## What It Actually Means

When an inference is stated to another person, Nyāya sets it out in five members: pratijñā, the thesis ('there is fire on the hill'); hetu, the reason ('because there is smoke'); udāharaṇa, the example that states the pervasion and points to a case ('wherever smoke, there fire, as in a kitchen'); upanaya, the application ('and this hill has such smoke'); and nigamana, the conclusion ('therefore there is fire on the hill'). The often-heard charge that this merely bloats the Greek three-term syllogism misreads its purpose. The example is not decoration: it is where the vyāpti is asserted and tied to an observed instance, supplying the epistemic grounding a purely formal syllogism deliberately brackets. The five members are the source school's answer to a real question the syllogism does not ask, namely how a stated inference actually transmits knowledge.

## Audience Metaphor

A mathematician's proof shows the steps are valid. A master showing an apprentice how to read a joint does more: this is the sign, here is the rule, and look, here is a real case where it held, now watch it hold in this new case, so here is the verdict. The apprentice leaves not with a valid form but with knowledge they can use. The fourth beat, the worked case, is the one a proof skips and Nyāya refuses to.

## Citations

1. Nyāya Sūtra 1.1.32-39 (the definitions of the five members) -- see [references/nyaya-sutra.md](../references/nyaya-sutra.md)
2. Uddyotakara, Nyāyavārttika, defending the five-membered form -- see [references/nyayavarttika.md](../references/nyayavarttika.md)
3. Annambhaṭṭa, Tarkasaṃgraha on parārthānumāna -- see [references/tarkasamgraha.md](../references/tarkasamgraha.md)
