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Introduction
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words as are justified by their actual functions or activities. For instance, a pūjārī [pūjā-kārin] (worshipper) is called a pūjārī when he performs pājā (worship). Similarly, only a strong man is entitled to be called Sakra. Indra can be called Purandara only when he is engaged in the act of destroying the cities of enemies, and so forth. This Naya is also the standpoint of etymologists.
As the fallacies of these different kinds of Nayas throw considerable light on the nature of the Nayas themselves, they may also be mentioned here. There are the following seven fallacies, corresponding to the seven Nayas:
1) Naigamābhāsa is the fallacy of the Naigama Naya, and consists in making a separation between the general and special properties of things, e.g., to speak of the existence and consciousness of soul as if they could be separated from one another.
2) Samgrahābhāsa, the fallacy of the Samgraha Naya, occurs when we describe the generic properties alone as constituting a thing. This gives rise to confusion of thought, because the general qualities alone can never constitute and actual object. For instance, the general qualities of a tree-only give us the idea of tree-ness, never an actual tree. The latter will have to be some particular kind of tree-an oak, a mango, a nimba, or the like and will, therefore, possess its own special qualities along with those of a tree in general. Whenever this fallacy has crept into a system of philosophy, the harvest of the scholar has been only a whirlwind of wordy abstractions instead of a knowledge of things as they exist in nature.
3) Vyavahārābhāsa lies in a wrong selection of
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