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142 :: Structure and Functions of Soul in Jainism
absolutely a knower it cannot become an object of its own cognition. The Jaina thinks that a number of traits can be distinguished in the knowledge attribute as they are distinguished in a momentary mode. The cognition of the self and the cognition of the objects may be held to be due to two traits of the same mode of the knowledge attribute. Vidyānanda stresses the point that the traits determining self-consciousness and object-consciousness are different, and thus he saves the Jaina position from the inconsistency of the activity in the self. Prabacandra also maintains the same view and states: “From the view-point of comprehension there is no distinction between the nature of an entity and the entity itself. From the view-point of enlightening the self and other objects there is a distinction."1 As a matter of fact self-consciousness and objectconsciousness are the two aspects of the same cognition. and one implies the other. On this interpretation Akalarka's view of non-distinction between consciousness and self consciousness can be consistently held. When the self is the object of our knowledge, the subject and the object constitute one unity which would imply distinction in the region of traits.
1. Prabhācandra: Nyāya-kumuda-candrodaya, p. 189
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