Jaina Ontology

SR No.: 001565
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: K K Dixit
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad
Publication Year: 1971
Total Pages: 222
Language: English
Classification: Book_English, Philosophy, Canon, & Agam
File Size: 15 MB

Page 36

THE AGE OF ĀGAMAS
23
Again the text often speaks of persons possessing avadhijñāna and vibhanga-jñāna— the former being a case of right cognition, the latter that of wrong cognition but both being cases of extra-sensory cognition;34 and since the persons in question are chadmastha we are to understand that even a chadmastha can possibly have extra-sensory cognition. As a matter of fact, certain passages actually distinguish between the cognitive capacities of the following four types of persons :
(1) chadmastha (2) adhovadhika ( = person with an imperfect type of avadhi) (3) paramāradhika ( = person with the most perfect type of avadhi)
(4) kevalias All this makes it clear that the early Jaina theoreticians distinguished between three types of cognition, viz. (1) the sensory cognition of a non-omniscient (2) the extra-sensory cognition of a non-omniscient (3) the extra-sensory cognition of an omniscient; besides, in each case they disitnguished between two sub-types viz. (1) the visionlike cogpi. tion and (2) the cogitation-like cognition; lastly, in the first two cases they also distinguished between a true variety and a false one. It was later on that manaḥ paryāya was conceived as a type of extra-seasory cognition (possessed by a non-omniscient) having for its object what another person is now thinking of; (about this type of cognition it was thought that it has no vision-like variety or a false variety). Simultaneously, additional thought was given to the sensory cognition of a non-omniscient. Here a distinction was made between cognition based on one's own sense perception and that based on somebody else's testimony ; both were supposed to be the cases of cogitation-like cognition and both to be possibly true or false. As for sense-perception itself it was identified with visionlike cognition and divided into two types, viz. visual and non-visual. Thus came into existence the final Jaina theory of cognition with its following classification :
(1) a non-omniscient's visual sense-perception (cakşurdarśana) (2) a non-omniscient's non-visual sense perception (acakşurdarśana) (3) a non-omniscient's true cogitation-like cognition based on one's
own sense-perception (matijñāna) (4) false variety of (3) (mati-ajñāna) (5) a non-omniscient's true cogitation-like cognition based on some
body else's testimony (śrutajñāna) (6) false variety of (5) (śruta-ajñāna) (7) a non-omniscient's extra-sensory vision-like cognition of the outer
world (avadhidarśana)