Page #1
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
________________
BUCHBESPRECHUNGEN/COMPTES RENDUES
703
übrigen keine Bibliographie, sondern alle Angaben in den Fussnoten, was in einer editorischen Anmerkung vermerkt wird (S.64). Ein Desideratum des Buches bleibt eine Vorstellung der Autoren sowie eine Indizierung, wie im vorausgegangenen Band 11 der Reihe. Nur bei der Namensnennung von Kulkarni ist eine Angabe in Klammern vermerkt: "(Hyderabad)". Bei den übrigen finden sich überhaupt keine Angaben. Neben diesen editorischen Kritikpunkten sind noch einige leicht korrigierbare Lektoratsfehler als formale Schwächen an dieser Stelle zu nennen.
Die Beiträge liefern interessante Aufschlüsse für einzelne Bereiche im riesigen Corpus der Literatur in neuindischen Sprachen. Die "transkreative" Bezugnahme auf Themen und Charaktere aus der religiösen Überlieferung spielt in den modernen indischen Literaturen Indiens eine kaum zu unterschätzende Rolle. Es kommt darauf an, eine für den indischen Kontext passende Typologie der Formen dieser Bezugnahme und ihrer Funktionen im literarischen Kunstwerk zu entwickeln, wofür sich aus dem vorliegenden Band wichtige Hinweise entnehmen lassen.
Heinz-Werner Wessler
CLAUDIUS NENNINGER: Aus gutem Grund. Prasastapädas anumānaLehre und die drei Bedingungen des logischen Grundes. Reinbek: Inge Wezler, Verlag für Orientalistische Fachpublikationen, 1992. viii + 169 pp (Philosophia Indica: Einsichten - Ansichten, Band 1].
In the introduction to this book (p. 9) the author gives a simple example of a conclusion by analogy (Analogieschluss): • Occidental logic is concerned with formal conclusiveness. • Therefore the Indian theory of anumāna, too, is concerned with formal
conclusiveness.
The plausibility of conclusions by analogy, he points out, depends on the extent to which the analogy concerns essential features. The question whether the analogy between occidental and Indian logic is close enough to justify the above conclusion is said to become clear later on in the book.
The last pages of the book (p. 156 f.) provide the answer to the question raised in its beginning. Two of the three conditions of the inferential sign are meant to secure inductively that the sign is inseparately connected with the property to be inferred. It follows that Indian logic is not primarily deductive logic, as it has so often been maintained.
Between the beginning and the end the book contains a translation and analysis of the section of the Prasastapādabhäsya that deals with anumana,
Page #2
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
________________
704
BUCHBESPRECHUNGEN/COMPTES RENDUES
followed by an discussion of the precise interpretation of the three conditions of the inferential sign. In the analysis and discussion, the passage concerned is dissected with the greatest possible care, and the arguments represented with the help of formal logic. Not infrequently the words of Prasastapāda allow of different formalisations. In such cases the different possibilities are considered, and more than once other parts of the section permit a reduction of the number of possible, or likely, interpretations.
A particularly interesting part of the book is the section on method (p. 12-20). Here Nenninger makes a number of observations on the significance of analysing the words of an ancient Indian author with the help of formal logic. Such an analysis does not necessarily lead to a more precise understanding of what the author had in mind. On the contrary, it may happen that our formal analysis introduces distinctions which the author was not aware of. Nenninger is equally interesting when he talks about the possibility of understanding another culture. It is not possible to criticize the postulate of a shared core of rationality for being Eurocentric. Such an assumption is rather essential for any form of dialogue between equal partners. Nenninger's observations are all the more to be appreciated against the background of the current tendency to question the possibility of trans-cultural understanding.*
This book is about Indian logic as it finds expression in the Prasastapādabhāṣya. Nenninger has chosen this text because it contains a particularly clear and coherent section on anumana, not because he is much interested in Vaiseșika. This latter circumstance is no doubt responsible for the following mistake, which, it seems, Western scholars of Vaiseşika are apt to make. Nenninger seems to think that every expression ending in the suffix -rva refers to an object belonging to the category 'universal' (sāmānya). He claims, e.g. (p. 29), that prayatnāntariyakatva "das Unmittelbar-auf-Bemühung-folgend-Sein"5 belongs to this category. And on pp. 11 and 112 he speaks about the universals "Mit-Rauchverschen-Sein" (dhamavattva) and "Mit-Feuer-versehen-sein" (agnivattva). But this is, of course, not correct. For universals reside in substances (dravya), qualities (guna) or movements (karman), and there only. For
4 For those with an interest in 'Postmodernism' in anthropology, Ernest Gellner's Postmodernism, Reason and Religion (Routledge, London and New York, 1992) should be essential reading.
Nenninger writes, no doubt by mistake, "das Unmittelbar-auf-Berührung-folgendSein.
5
Page #3
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
________________
BUCHBESPRECHUNGEN/COMPTES RENDUES
705
prayatnāntariyakatva to be a universal, prayatnāntarīyaka must be a substance, a quality, or a movement. But the substances, qualities and movements are enumerated in the Vaišeșika system, and prayatnāntarīyaka does not figure among them (nor do dhūmavat and agnivat). The fact that Vaišeşika accepted the category of universals, did not bar them from using the suffix -tva, like everyone else, in less ontologically burdensome ways.
Nenninger's book is the work of a philosophical, not a philological interpreter (p. 12). He yet offers a philological analysis (pp. 52 ff.) of the first lines of the section studied, which deserves our attention. This passage enumerates the three conditions of the linga 'Beweismerkmal' '[inferential] sign'. The passage is remarkable in that it contains a kind of definition of the correct [inferential] sign, which is presented in two different forms: first in verse, next in prose. Nenninger thinks there are reasons to believe that the two verses here presented were quoted from another work, whereas the prose paraphrases were written by Prasastapada himself. Let us consider his reasons.
I am not sure whether Nenninger has succeeded in showing that the paraphrase assigns two different meanings to the one word anumeya in the first verse. But I think there can be no doubt that he is right in his view that the verse (originally, or even as understood by Prasastapāda) uses the word anumeya in the sense anumeyadharma 'property to be inferred', and defines the linga in these terms, whereas the paraphrase uses this term in the sense pratipipădayişitadharmavisista dharmin "Beschaffenheitstrager, welcher ausgezeichnet ist durch die Beschaffenheit, von der man wunscht, sie erkennen zu lassen" (tr. Nenninger p. 38); in English: 'propertypossessor characterized by the property which one wishes to make known'. If we think of the common example "the hill has fire, because it has smoke" - where, of course, the linga is smoke -, the anumeya is fire in the verse, whereas the paraphrase considers 'the hill as characterized by fire' to be the anumeya.
This difference between verse and paraphrase gains interest in view of the fact that Dignåga, in his Pramāṇasamuccaya, discusses the question what exactly is to be inferred: the property-possessor (dharmin; in our example the hill), the property (dharma; fire), or a combination of the two. Dignāga himself holds that what is to be inferred is the property-possessor characterized by the property (dharmavisista dharmin), and he calls it
6
H
He does not discuss the fact that the verse uses the verbal form sambaddham, whereas the paraphrase has sahacaritam. We may have to read the paraphrase as one concerning the whole first line, not each individual word.
Page #4
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
________________
706
BUCHBESPRECHUNGEN/COMPTES RENDUES
anumeya." It would seem, therefore, that Prasastapāda gave an 'improved' interpretation of a traditional verse, improved in the sense that it followed the suggestions made by Dignaga.
This conclusion is strengthened by another consideration as well. The first line of the verse (yad anumeyena sambaddham) is unmetrical: it has one syllable too many.8 This, as I have argued elsewhere, is most easily explained by the assumption that originally this line did not have anumeya, but rather sadhya (perhaps: yat tu sadhyena sambaddham). It is known that sadhya was used in earlier Vaišeṣika works, and it is again Dignaga's Pramanasamuccaya which criticizes the use of this word. One gains the impression that Prasastapāda did not only reinterpret the verse under consideration, but that he changed (at least) one of its words as well; both these activities influenced by Dignliga's discussion in the Pramanasamuccaya.
In the earlier publication referred to above, I argued that the two verses together with their paraphrases rnight constitute an unacknowledged quotation from the Katandi, which seems to have exerted a major influence on Prasastapāda. In view of Nenninger's observations, this position will have to be adjusted. The verses now appear as quotations in the Prasastapadabhāṣya, their paraphrases, to all appearances, are the work of Prasastapāda himself.
It is, of course, still possible to maintain that Prasastapāda quoted these verses from the Katandi The evidence in support of this position, it must however be admitted, has now lost some of its force. For one of the main arguments in its favour the Varttika style of part of the Katandi - does not apply to the two verses and their paraphrases, once we admit that the paraphrases in this case have a different author. However, not all of the Katandi was written in this style. And the influence of the Kaṭandi on the Prasastapādabhäşya appears to have been very strong; it is, in fact, the only text (besides the Vaiséşika Sutra) which we have reason to believe was actually cited by its author.
9
-
7
See Nenninger p. 162; Hattori, 1972:172-73.
8 Note that K. Rüping (1991: 320) "corrects" the text into yad anumeyasambaddham, without the slightest textual support.
See Bronkhorst, 1993: 158 ff.
Page #5
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
________________ BUCHBESPRECHUNGEN/COMPTES RENDUES 707 To conclude this review, Aus gutem Grund breaks new ground in the interpretation of early Indian logic, and has something to offer to those primarily interested in early Vaisesika as well. Johannes Bronkhorst