Studies in Jainism

SR No.: 002008
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: M P Marathe, Meena A Kelkar, P P Gokhle
Publisher: Indian Philosophical Quarterly Publication Puna
Publication Year: 1984
Total Pages: 284
Language: English
Classification: Book_English, Philosophy, & Religion
File Size: 16 MB

Page 136

THE JAINA CONCEPT OF LOGIC
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to be an instrument of knowledge -- knowledge of things which are either pratyakşa-a matter of observation or paroksa-a matter of inference. It is this characteristic which, to my mind, sets the Jaina theory of pramāna apart from the Jaina theory of naya The Nayavā da or the theory of na ya in no sense, is an instrument or a part of the instrument of knowledge.
(9) These are not all the important features of the Jaina theory of pramāņa. I have drawn attention to only some of them which I presonally think to be important enough to set the Jaina concept of logic apart, for example, from the Nyāya and the Buddhist concepts of logic.14 Furthermore the Jaina logicians distinguished the concept of pramāna (the word comes from mā dhā tu which means 'to measure') from the concept of naya (the word comes from ni dhātu which means 'to lead'). I am inclined to think that the concept of naya is not a concept of logic. It is used by the Jaina thinkers to describe the philosopical positions of the other thinkers who held theories which were either opposed to or at least different from theirs. The role that they assign to this concept is clearly illustrated by their assertion nayābhāsesvajainamatā nā mantarbhavah.is The acceptance of nayavāda on the part of the Jaina logician, I have indicated in the last sentence, is the acceptance of a certain attitude to what the other non-Jaina thinkers had to say about the structure of and the furniture in their respective metaphysical worlds. The concept of naya, to be sure, was never applied to such empirically ascertainable cases like 'Fire burns', or. A high level of colestrol in the human body is one of the causal conditions of cardiological diseases. However, one can talk of the criterion of the distinction between a naya vākya and a pramāna vākya. This I have done elsewhere.16
(10) Professor Barlingay in his celebrated book on Indian logic 16 observes :
The most important feature of the Jaina logic is its introduction of saptabhangi naya, and formulation of the logic of
possibility or syādvāda.17 He adds :
I feel that these two doctrines are independent and are valuable to logic. It must have been due to some confusion amongst the later Jaina logicians that these two separate theories were identified as one 18