Cosmology Old and New

SR No.: 006547
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: G R Jain
Publisher: Bharatiya Gyanpith
Publication Year: 1991
Total Pages: 232
Language: English
Classification: Book_English & Philosophy
File Size: 12 MB

Page 198

166
COSMOLOGY OLD AND NEW
the latter. 347
Even the great modern thinkers and scientists like Eddington have found it impossible to frame a suitable definition of a 'substance'. Referring to the present world, he says, "How shall I describe it? It has extension; it is comparatively permanent; it is coloured; above all it is substantial. By substantial I do not merely mean that it is constituted of 'substance' and by the word I am trying to convey to you some conception of its intrinsic nature. It is a 'thing'; not like space, which is a mere negation; 348 nor like time, which is-Heaven knows what! But that will not help you to my meaning because it is the distinctive characteristic of a 'thing' to have this substantiality, and I do not think substantiality can be described better than by saying that it is the kind of nature exemplified by an ordinary table. And so we go round in circles."
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SUTRA 39.
कालश्च 349 ।। ३९ ॥ KĀLAŚCA [39]
(Time is also a substance.)
In the Svetämbara text the reading is :
"कालश्चेत्येके" (कालः च इति एके ) ।
(भाष्यम् : एके त्वाचार्य्या व्याचक्षते कालोऽपि द्रव्यमिति ।। )
(According to some Acarya, Time is also a substance.)
Acarya Siddhasenagani regards Time as a modification of Jiva and Ajiva (soul and matter). In the Svetambara work Jivabhigama the same view is expressed but in Bhagavate-sutra and other standard works Time has been regarded as a separate reality. Acarya Umaswami, the author of the present work, having first firmly established the characteristics of a reality in sütras 29, 30 and 38 finds that all the characteristics mentioned in these sutras are inherent in the entity called the Time and therefore now at this late stage he mentions Time to be a reality
Pancastikaya-sara, S.B.J. Series.
347. A Philosophical Introduction to
Vol. III, p. XXX.
348. Space is not a negation but a real substance. This fact has been established in pages 106-108 The nature of time as a reality has been explained in pages 113-118 and more has been said in the following sutra No. 39.
349. Read this sutra in conjunction with sutra 22.