Jaina Theory of Multiple Facets of Reality and Truth

SR No.: 001746
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Nagin J Shah
Publisher: B L Institute of Indology
Publication Year: 2000
Total Pages: 168
Language: English
Classification: Book_English, Philosophy, & Nyay
File Size: 12 MB

Page 11

INTRODUCTION
The central philosophy of Jainism is anekāntavāda. Ontologically it means that reality is many-sided, it has manifold aspects, it has infinite characters (anantadharmātmaka). As it has infinite characters, it possesses even opposite characters. It is both existent and non-existent, permanent and transient, one and many, describable and indescribable, etc. It is not difficult to find non-Jaina thinkers agreeing with the Jainas on this point. Acārya Sāyaṇa accepts the possibility of co-existence of being and non-being.' Upanişads too maintain that reality has opposite characteristics.?
Epistemologically its meaning is as follows. Knowledge which comprehends reality in its entirety with all its infinite aspects or characters is the perfect knowledge embodying the whole truth. Knowledge which grasps all the infinite characters can do so simultaneously; it cannot grasp them successively.; And such knowledge is possible in an omniscient one alone. It is impossible for an ordinary or normal human being to know reality in its entirety with all its infinite characteristics. As a man can attend to and know one aspect only at a time his knowledge is always partial and relative to that aspect. His knowledge embodies partial truth. The aspect which a man attends to is governed by his intention or purpose in hand. It is only because we forget this limitation and dogmatically regard our knowledge or view as unconditionally true, that we come to quarrel and become intol
1. .... tathāpi bhāvābhāvayoḥ sahāvasthānam api sambhavati/Sāyana-bhāşya on Rgveda
X.129.1. 2. tad ejati tan naijati tad dūre tad antike / Isa, 5, anor anīyān mahato mahīyān / Katha,
II.20, sad asac cāmrtam ca yat/ Praśna, II.5. 3. Samantabhadra accepts this possibility. See Aptamīmāṁsā, 105.