Verse 7.4

भूमिरापोऽनलो वायुः खं मनो बुद्धिरेव च। अहङ्कार इतीयं मे भिन्ना प्रकृतिरष्टधा।।7.4।।

bhūmir-āpo ’nalo vāyuḥ khaṁ mano buddhir eva cha ahankāra itīyaṁ me bhinnā prakṛitir aṣhṭadhā

Meaning

Yo, it's like this: Earth, water, fire, air, ether, mind, intellect, and ego—that's My Nature, broken down into eight parts.

Commentary

Okay, so like, this eightfold nature is, like, the *lower* level nature, the Apara Prakriti. The five basic elements? Yeah, those are formed from the Tanmatras, the root elements, through this whole Pancikarana thing, the fivefold mix. Tanmatras are, like, the super subtle root elements. In this verse, earth, water, etc.? Those are the super subtle, basic elements that the five basic elements are made from. Mind? That's Ahamkara, the cause of mind. Intellect? That's Mahat, the cause of intellect. Ahamkara? That's the Avyaktam, the unmanifested MulaPrakriti, all mixed up with Avidya and all these latent tendencies. Ahamkara is, like, the main thing that causes all our actions, it's the most important thing in humans, everything else depends on it. So, the Avyaktam and Ahamkara together are just called Ahamkara, like, if you mix food with poison, it's just poison.