The Doctrine of Triguna: Sattva, Rajas, and Tamas as a Fivefold Framework for Human Conduct in the Kedi Purana

This paper undertakes a detailed examination of the doctrine of Triguna — the threefold classification of qualities known as Sattva, Rajas, and Tamas — as expounded in the Kedi Purana, and situates this account within the wider tradition of guna theory found in Samkhya philosophy and the Bhagavad Gita. While the classical sources generally treat the three gunas as forces of nature (prakriti) that condition thought, perception, and action, the Kedi Purana offers a distinctive elaboration: it resolves each guna into five concrete elements of lived experience — lifestyle, nature, perspective, diet, and tendency — and further proposes that no individual is governed by a single guna in its entirety, but rather by a combination of two gunas distributed unevenly across these five elements. Drawing on illustrative examples, a comparative table, and a discussion of the framework's practical and psychological implications, this paper argues that the Kedi Purana's model offers an unusually operational account of guna theory, one capable of explaining observable behavioural variation while resisting simplistic equations between outward practices, such as diet, and inward moral character.