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The Impact of Nyāya and Vaiseșika
School on Jaina Philosophy
The history of Jaina philosophy extends over a long period of 2600 years. The concepts of Jaina metaphysics and cpistemology can be traced as early as the history of Jainism begins. Not only Mahāvīra (6" cent. BC) but the tradition of his predecessor Lord Pārsvanātha (8' cent. BC) also bears clear marks ofthe fundamental concepts of Jaina philosophy. Tradition reckons twenty-three prophets as having preceded to Mahāvīra, which takes us back to fabulous antiquity of the tradition. Pārsvanātha, born at Varanasi was the 23" Tīnthankara. Thus, historically Jaina philosophy existed long before the emergence of Nyāya-Vaiseșika schools of Indian Philosophy. Due to the earlier emergence of Jaina philosophy, we do not find any impact of Nyāya-Vaiścsika school on the fundamental concepts of Jaina metaphysics and epistemology, such as Pašīcāstikāyavāda, nine categories (Nava-tattva), six kinds of living beings (Sadjivanikāya) including five kinds of knowledge (Pascajñāna). On these earlier concepts we can trace some impacts of carlier Upanişads, early Buddhism as well as other contemporary Sramanic traditions. Generally, Jainism and Buddhism are regarded as the schools emerged against the sanctity of Vedic lore and oppressive priest craft. But this is not true as both of the traditions have their independent origin. Though, independent of Buddhism, Jainism resembles it in several respects, e.g. in its repudiation of the authority of Veda, its pessimistic outlook on life and its refusal to believe in Supreme God. Being sister religions of the same Śramanic tradition, both have various philosophical, religious and ethical concepts as common. Both of the philosophical schools, being based more or less on the same theory of Vibhajyavāda,
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discord the one-sided views of their conteniporary thinkers. Buddha's approach being negative one, culminated in Sūnyavāda but his penelrating vision led him to proclaim that the truth lies in the middle path. He opined that any kind of extreme view was likely to give rise to one-sided opinion, which by creating obsession may obscure our vision. Mahāvīra's approach being positive culminated in Anekānta vāda i.e. theory of Non-absolutism. This nonabsolutistic approach of both the schools are totally absent in NyāyaVaiseșika schools. By the emergence of Nyāya-Vaiścșika schools, the earlier phase of Jaina and Buddhist philosophy were well established. But this does not mean that Nyāya-Vaišeșika philosophy has no impact on Jajna philosophy. It has certain influence on later established concepts of Jaina philosophy, which we shall discuss in this article.
The history of the development of Jaina philosophy can be shown in following four phases: I. The Āgamic philosophy - 55 cent. BC to 3“ cent. AD
The period of Logical presentation of Jaina philosophy and
its theory of Anekantavada -4" cent. A.D. to 744 cent. AD Ill. The period of critical evaluation of other schools of Indian
philosophy and - 814 cent. AD to 15" cent. AD IV. The period of applying of Navya-Nyāya technique in Jaina
philosophy - 17th to 18' cent. AD.
Out of these five phases of the development of Jaina philosophy, the first phase may be called purely Āgamic. One cannot trace any impact of Nyāya-Vaišeșika schools on it. It was the second phase where some impacts of Nyāya-Vaiseșika school can be traced on Jaina metaphysical and epistemological concepts. In the third phase, Jaina thinkers, while making a critical estimate of Nyāya and Vaiseșika schools, adopted the Nyaya-Vaiścșika concepts and
also of their opponents. Jainas by synthesizing these opposite views
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with their theory of Anekāntavāda evolved some new theories such as Sadasadkāryavāda, Parataḥ-svatah-prānāyavāda etc in support of their philosophy. In this phase, Jainas have vehicmently criticized the philosophical doctrines of Nyāya-Vaiseșika and pointed out their logical as well as practical weaknesses of their doctrines based on one-sidedness views. In the fourth and last phase, Jaina philosophers adopted the Navya-nyāya (Neo-logic) technique of Gangesa Upādhyāya (12-13 cent. AD) for sound and logical presentation of their philosophical doctrines. It was a new turn to the development of Indian logic. The Jaina scholars also could not escape from the powerful trend of this thought. This technique made a profound influence on Jaina Acāryas
It is established fact that no philosophy emerges in vacuum. It has some impacts of its carlier as well as contemporary philosophies either in a positive or negative form. In other words, either they accept the philosophical concepts of their earlier or contemporary philosophical schools with certain logical modifications, or reject them by showing their logical inconsistencies. Jaina thinkers had used both the techniques, but instead of total rejection, they synthesized them with their opponent's view. Thus, the Jaina doctrine is nothing but a synthesization of two conflicting opposite views. Jaina philosophers used this technique regarding Nyāya-Vaiseșika school also.
Some metaphysical concepts of Jaina philosophy which were established in the first phase of its development such as (1) the doctrine of Pañcāstikaya, (2) the nine categories (Nava-tattva), (3) the six types of living beings (Sadji vanikāya), (4) the eight fold karmas (Aștakarna-prakrti) etc. have no impact of Nyāya-Vaiseșika school. Similarly, on some ethico-religious concepts such as Cāturyāma dharma, Pañca-mahăvratas, four-lold or three-fold path of liberation (Triratna) and the concept of five types of knowledge (Pašīcajñāna) etc. we do not find any impact of Nyāya-Vaiseșika school. Though, in the 6 century BC of this first phase, Jaina
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philosophers logically presented these doctrines without assimilating the views of other contemporary schools on their own footings.
The impact of other philosophical traditions on Jaina philosophy starts from the second phase i.e. after 2" century BC. In this period Jaina thinkers propounded the doctrine of six substances (Sad-dravya) and explained the relationship between substance (Dravya), attribute (Guna) and modes (Paryaya). Though, the words such as sat, dravya and astikaya were already used in Indian philosophy for Reality, but originally they belonged to different traditions. The word 'sat'belongs to Vedic tradition, while the word dravya was used by Nyaya-Vaiseṣika. Similarly, the word astikāya originally belongs to the Jaina tradition but later on Jaina thinkers used all these three words for Reality. Etymologically, these three words connote three different meanings. The word 'sar' means that which exists without changing, while the word 'dravya' means that which exists with changes. The word astikaya means that which exists with extension in space. The Jaina doctrine of Sad-dravya was a new development but really there was nothing new in this doctrine of six substances except the addition of kāla (time) as a substance along with the five astikāyas. It was a later development of the doctrine of pañcāstikāya. The acceptance of the word "dravya" in Jaina tradition seems to be an influence of Nyaya-Vaiseşika philosophy. According to Jaina philosophy the number of the substances is six while Vaišeṣika school accepts nine substances. In the list of both these schools akāśa, kāla and ātman (jiva) are common. Akasa and atman are also included in the list of pañcāstikāya. Here, only inclusion of kāla (Time) may be considered as an impact of Vaiseṣika school. It is worth to note that in the Śvetambara tradition even up to the seventh century AD, kala was not accepted as an independent substance by some of the scholars. According to them kala is only a mode (444) of jīva and pudgala (matter). The debate whether time can be regarded as an independent substance or not, begins from 3" century AD, before the formulation
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of Tattvärthasútra and differences in this regard continued up to the period of Višeşāvasyaka-bhâsyai.e. 7 century AD. Regarding definitions of dravya, guna and kāla, we find some similarities in Uttarādhyayana-sūtra, Vaiseșika-sūtra as well as Tattvärthasūtra. Scholars are of the opinion that the Tattvārthasūtra and its autocommentary have some influence of Vaišeşika-sūtraand Yoga-sútra. When we talk of the impact of Nyāya-Vaiseșika school on the metaphysical doctrine of Jainism, we should not forget that Jainas have of course borrowed some of the terminologies/ideas of NyāyaVaiseșika school but they incorporated them in their own way with required modifications and not as it is. For example, regarding substance, which possessed of guna (attributes) and paryāya(modes) Jainas are very clear in their concept that guna and paryaya are not two different entities as the Nyāya holds but they are two aspects of the same Reality and they are interchangeable in ditferent relations. Similarly, Jaina also not admit the destruction of all gunas with the destruction of a dravya and the emergence of all the guņas a new with every new dravya, as the Nyāya holds.
So far as the impact of Nyāya school on Jaina epistemology is concerned, Jaina philosophers have adopted some ideas of Nyāya school in Toto and some ideas in their modified form. As I have already discussed, the doctrine of five-fold knowledge (pañcajñāna) has its origin in the philosophy of Lord Pārsva (8 cent. BC) that is why we do not find any impact of Nyāya School on this doctrine. Even in Tattvārthasútra (3"cent. AD), while establishing these five types of knowledge as pramāna, we do not irace any conceptua} impact of these schools on it. In the beginning of Christian era, when the discussions regarding the nature and types of pramāņas took place in different schools of Indian philosophy; the Jaina thinker Umāsvāti defined those five types of knowledge or knowledge itself as pramāņa. Tattvartha-sūtra accepts only two types of pramāņai.e. pratyaksa (direct) and paroksa (indirect) and satisfy himself by dividing these five types of knowledge into two. At the
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prima facie it shows an impact of Vaiseṣika School on Jaina epistemology but in my humble opinion it would be a wrong supposition. Here the similarity is only regarding two broad categories or the numbers of Pramāņas and not in the concepts itself. For Jainas the knowledge itself is pramāņa but for Nyāya-Vaiseṣika pramāņa is the means of knowledge (p4qà sàn zfà pm). Secondly, for Umasvati, the meaning of pratyakṣa (direct knowledge) and paroksa (indirect knowledge) are totally different from that of Nyaya's definition of pratyakșa and parokṣa. Umās vāti maintains that the knowledge acquired through sense organs and mind is not a direct knowledge, but it is an indirect knowledge (parokṣa). On going through Tattvärthasutra, one can observe that though Umāsvāti also adopted some concept of epistemology prevalent that time, but he explained it according to his own Agamic tradition.
The first impact of Nyāya School on Jaina epistemology can be traced in the canonical works of later period (3 - 4th century A.D.) or in the late incorporated works of early canonical works.
The Jaina theory of pramāņas takes it birth from the scattered ideas found in the canonical works. In the Agamic period or the first phase, the five-fold division of knowledge, which later on considered as pramāņa, remained pure and unalloyed. In the second stage when the idea of two-fold classification came into existence, particularly in Niryukti literature and Tattvärthasūtra, it was certainly due to external influence, yet the spirit of Agamas remained dominating. For the first time, in Anuyogadvara-sūtra five-fold division of Agamic tradition goes into background and the four-told division of the Nyaya School came into prominence. Here, the Jaina thinkers adopted the view of Nyaya School in Toto. The four-fold pramāņas -Pratyakṣa, Anumāna, Agama and Upamāna, are mentioned in various canonical works such as Samavayanga, Bhagavati, Anuyogadvāra, etc. in the name of hetu (), vyavasaya or pramāņa. In the canonical works, we find mention of four-fold as well as three-fold divisions of pramāņas as of Nyāya and Samkhya School respectively. Siddhasena Divakara also followed this three-fold
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________________ 192 division of pramana in his Nyayavatara (4"-5 cent. AD). Another impact of Nyaya School on Jaina epistemology is seen in Nandisatra (5" Century) where the sense-cognition is included into pratyaksa (Nandisutra-4) following the Nyaya tradition. Later on Jaina scholars such as Jinabhadragani Ksamasramana and Akalanka designated it as 'perception according to the common usage (samvyavaharika pratyaksa). Regarding the five organs (patica-avayavas) of interence (anunana) Jaina thinkers are also agreed withi Nyaya school. But in Niryukti literature we come a cross with ten organs of inference along with above-mentioned five organs. Though the concept of five organs is common to both the traditions, but the idea of ten organs is a peculiarity of Jaina tradition only. Similarly, due lo tlie influence of Nyaya School, Jaina thinkers also adopted the threefold division of inference ( 1) such as parvavat (9697), scsavat (1996) and samanyato-drsta (14RAC). In the Jaina canonical works of later period, we find mention of this classification, which shows the impacts of Nyaya School on Jaina epistemology. The last, but no least, major influence of Nyaya School on Jaina epistemology is the adoption of Navya-nyaya technique of Gangesa by the two most versatile Jaina scholars- Upadhyaya Yasovijaya (17" century AD) and Vimaladasa. Yasovijaya's Anekantavyavastha written in the neo-nyaya style helped the reestablishment of Anekantavada. Similarly, the Jaina-tarkabhasa and Jnanabindu were two important contributions to the Jaina Pramanasastra. Vimaldas's Saptabhangitararigini a trcatment of Saptabhangi (doctrine of seven fold predications) is the most celebrated work of Jaina logic written in the same style. Some traditional Jaina scholars may be reluctant in accepting the Nyaya impact on Jaina philosophy but in my humble opinion, it would be against the intellectual honesty. First of all we should decide the chronology of the development of different philosophical schools as well as philosophical thoughts honestly and then the mutual influence be traced on the basis of chronology.