Adhishṭhāna
Adhishṭhāna · adhi-shṭhāna, “ground, support”
Grammar: neuter noun, from the root sthā (to stand) with the prefix adhi (over, upon): “that on which something stands”.
Meaning: the ground, the base or substratum on which a thing rests and appears; in the teaching on the ātmā, the unchanging reality on which the changing world appears. A presiding devatā is likewise called adhishṭhāna-devatā.
In the scriptures: the Bhāgavata Purāṇa uses the word in Śrī Kṛshṇa‘s teaching to Uddhava.
Śrī Kṛshṇa tells Uddhava that the threefold modification of prakṛti, the body, the senses and the mind, shines by resting on the ātmā. It is imagined by ajñāna, for it is not there at the beginning or at the end and appears only in the middle. “Can its changes, birth, growth and the rest, be in the ātmā, which is their ground?” They cannot; for what is not there at the beginning and the end is not there in the middle either, and only what is there at the beginning and the end is there in the middle (Bhāgavata Purāṇa, Skandha 11, Chapter 19).
Closing his teaching on the intent of the Veda, Śrī Kṛshṇa says that the Veda sets him out as many forms, the five bhūtas beginning with ākāśa, denies them all, and what remains is he himself. “This alone is the intent of all the Vedas. Taking me as the ground, the Veda restates the world founded on difference, at the end denies all of it as māyā, and comes to rest” (Bhāgavata Purāṇa, Skandha 11, Chapter 21).
Related terms: Ādhāra · Ātmā · Adhyāsa · Māyā · Adhidaiva
Sources
- Bhāgavata Purāṇa, Skandha 11, Chapters 19, 21