Svayambhū

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Svayambhū (Skt., ‘unoriginated’). The capacity of objects to be self-existent, not dependent on the causal agency of another, and thus perhaps to sustain themselves from the idea concealed within them. It also represented an early attempt in Hinduism to recognize an unproduced Producer of all that is, an originator such as Puruṣa, Prajāpati or Brahmā. In the Purāṇas, it becomes the principle of indefinite cosmic elaboration, but in Advaita and in the Upaniṣads, it expresses the self-existent nature of Brahman. Vaiṣṇavites and Śaivites apply it to Viṣṇu and Śiva respectively. In Buddhism, it is applied to the Buddha as the one who is utterly independent of support in the apparent cosmos, and in Mahāyāna it is comparably applied to all buddhas, e.g. Ādi Buddha.