viñña

Viññāṇa (Pali; Sanskrit viññāṇa) is a term in Buddhist philosophy usually translated as consciousness or cognition. In many texts it refers to the aspect of experience that knows or apprehends an object, as distinguished from vedanā (feeling), saññā (perception), saṅkhāra (mental formations), and rūpa (form) that together constitute the five aggregates (pañca-khandha). Viññāṇa is conditioned and impermanent, arising on the contact (phassa) between a sense base and its object and ceasing when contact ends. It is not considered a permanent self or soul.

In early Buddhist and Theravāda Abhidhamma frameworks, viññāṇa is treated as a process or event of cognition rather than a single enduring essence. It is analyzed as discrete consciousness moments that arise in rapid sequence during experience. The concept is central to explaining how beings experience the world while remaining distinct from the notion of a fixed self.

There are six sense-specific forms of viññāṇa corresponding to the main sense bases: cakkhu-viññāṇa (eye-consciousness), sota-viññāṇa (ear-consciousness), ghāṇa-viññāṇa (nose-consciousness), jivhā-viññāṇa (tongue-consciousness), kāya-viññāṇa (body-consciousness), and manoviññāṇa (mind-consciousness). Each arises dependently on its base and object, and together they participate in the flow of experience.

In practice and meditation, viññāṇa is examined to see its impermanent and non-self nature, helping to illuminate the Buddhist understanding of experience as conditioned and transient rather than inherently centralized or autonomous. Variants of the term exist in Sanskrit as viññāṇa; some transliterations render it as viñña or viñña.