Facets of Jain Philosophy Religion and Culture

SR No.: 002012
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Shreechand Rampuriya, Ashwini Kumar, T M Dak, Anil Dutt Mishra
Publisher: Jain Vishva Bharati
Publication Year: 1996
Total Pages: 400
Language: English
Classification: Book_English, Philosophy, Religion, & Nyay
File Size: 23 MB

Page 125

108 Anekāntavāda and Syādvāda
viewpoints under dicussion they constantly, as it were, attack its frontiers, and await its reconciliation with them in the sphere of a fuller and more69 valid knowledge which is the sphere of pramäna.
Theoratically the viewpoints from which an object or an event could be perceived are not merely numerous" (anekavikalpa) but infinite?l in number (anantaprakāram) because even the humblest fact of existence is infinitely manifold and therefore can be an object of various modes of analysis. But this way of looking at the subject is too broad (vyāsa or vistāra72) or gross (sthüla) and, therefore, does not vouchsafe to us a compact view of reality ca the basis of which we can develop a practicable analytical method by means of which we may
69. This phrase "more valid" is advisedly used here. This becomes clear when we notice
the controversy, met with in Jaina works, as to whether the partial truth conveyed by a naya is as valid as the full truth conveyed by pramäna. Vidyānanda attempts an anwser to this by employing an analogical argument, often repeated by writers since, in which he compares naya to a part of a sea which is prumana (TSU, p. 118, kā. 5 and the likā thereon). See also SRK, pp. 1044-7. Insofar as the part is identical with the whole--it is identical since it is a legitimate part of the whole-a naya shares the validity, at any rate in some measure, of pramāna. But, insofar as it is different from the whole-it is different from the whole, in some sense, otherwise the part and the whole become indistinguishable--a naya is invalid. The conclusion implied is a simple one, viz., that a part (naya) is not eschewed by the whole (pramāna); that the whole itself would not be but for the combination of such parts; that the part is valid (mānārmako nayah; näpyasatyo nayah) so far as it goes, and that is becomes invalid when its partial truth is taken to be the whole truth when it is called a nayābhāsa, or kunaya, or durnaya,
The above conclusion is generally agreed to in spirit if not in letter also, but most writers including Vidyānanda, Jinabhadra and his commentator Maladhari Hemachandra, however, do not seem to accede to this conclusion whole-heartedly, although they do not eventually disagree with it (see VBJ, gā. 2277 and SHM thereon). For some of expressions with which they describe the nature of rayas are more appropriate to the description of the nature of nayabhasas or durnayas. For instance, nayas are said to be incapable of being vastuno gamakāh (pratyekāvasthāyām tudagamakatvāt). Further, they are said to be heretical (mithyätmadrstitvāt), contradictory (virodhato, or virodhitval), inimical (vairivat) in their character.
Another factor which seems to confirm the attitude of Jinabhadra, more especially of his great commentator, is the quotation, by the latter, of a devotional verse, the second line of which is in tune with the view suggested by the two writers:
udadhāviva sarvasindhavah samudirnästvayi nätha drstayah /
na ca tāsu bhavān pradrsyate pravibhaktāsu saritsvivodadhih // See VB), gā. 2266 and SHM, on 2265-6. 70. jāvaiya vayanavahā tāvaiyā honti nayavāyā / STP, III. 47.
Jāvanto vayanapahā tāvanto vā nayāvi sahāvo/ VBJ, gā. 2265.
vyāsato' nekavikalpā iti / PNTA, VII. 4 and the SRK thereon in SRK, p. 1047. 71. nayaś canantah/SM (text), p. 161. 72. See PNTA, VII. 4 and the SRK thereon.