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

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Jaina Theory of Multiple Facets of Reality and Truth
superseded by it. Hence it is not called identity in this theory but it is pointed out that one term of the relation (attribute or whole) exists inseparably from the other (substratum or part), the inseparability being eternal although no term may be infinite or permanent. This eternal inseparability may accordingly be regarded as a form of concrete identity.
12. Now this identity is taken as knowable by perception, unlike the implicational identity of Hegel which is supposed to be known only by necessary thought. As a percept it is a distinct among distincts, not as in the Hegelian theory comprehensive of the distincts. Ultimately there are objects like the simple atoms distinct in themselves and not inhering in anything beyond them. Other objects like attributes and wholes exist as distinct but inseparable from their substrata. Finally, the relation samavaya or this concrete identity is also a distinct object. Thus priority is assigned, as has been pointed out, in this system to distinction.
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13. The relation of Samavaya implies three grades of distincts— objects that must be in some substratum, the substrata, and the relation itself. The question may be asked if relation is a distinct being in the sense in which the objects of the other two grades are distinct. These objects are distinct as the terms of the relation: objects which do not inhere in anything are still determinate as having attributes and wholes inhering in them. Not that the knowledge of a substance presupposes the knowledge of what inheres in it: it is known as distinct prior to the analysis. But in point of being, every object except relation must either have something inhering in it or itself inhere in something else or be in both these situations. Relation is not itself related to anything beyond, for then there would be a regressus ad infinitum. It is a distinct existent only by self-identity or svasamaväya.
14. Self-identity, however, is not a relation of distincts at all. Granting-what is not admitted by all-that Samavaya is known by perception, this self-identity or Sva-samavāya is not a perceptible fact but is only an artificial thought-content. 'Self-related' means unrelated in the objective. Samavaya is certainly known along with its terms but as a fact it is only unrelated and cannot be even said to be definitely different from its terms. Can it then be determinate in itself? It may