Tamoyoga is a class of inauspicious beings not eligible for emancipation and therefore consigned to Naraka (hell), according to the Dvaita Vedanta system of Madhva. Madhavacharya’s radical realism holds that reality is two fold
- Independent
- Dependent
The Supreme Being Narayana is the one and only independent reality and all else, intelligent selves and insentient matter, are dependent. Since difference is the very essential nature of a substance, whether sentient or insentient, the principle of gradation in created beings follows a logical result. Hence a class of selves eternally damned.
In Madhva system, the individual self, spiritual in nature, is endowed with limited power of will, knowledge and action. It is eternal, beginning-less, limited, finite in size, but has distinct characteristics that differentiate it from other souls and in gradation. There, this difference is both qualitative and quantitative.
A self’s spiritual core is crippled by a subtle material sheath from beginningless time and stays with the being through all is transmigration. The release from this material bondage is final emancipation (liberation).
The above concept of a self enables its classification into
- Sattvik – eligible for release (These are the best of men, gods, sages and forefathers)
- Rajasik – ordinary men who are always bound.
- Tamasik – fit only for perdition (lowest men, pisachas, rakshasas and daityas)
The concept of Tamoyoga based on sound rigorous logic and textual sanction is the only satisfactory and convincing solution for the presence of wrong in the world, according to the Madhva School of dualistic Vedanta.