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FAITH KNOWLEDGE AND CONDUCT
predication. Of these the first three are the simple forms of predication, and the remaining four their compounds. They may be contradictory with reference to one another or, in the case of the compound ones, in regard to their own contents.
Jaina Metaphysicians advise the inserting of the term syat (from a particular point of view) mentally before every such statement of predication, so that the mind be directed to the necessity of referring them to their standpoints. The statements would then read as syat S is P; syat S is not P, and so on. In this way the attention will be directed to finding out the point of view from which a statement proceeds. If this is not borne in mind when reading the Word of a Divine Teacher, the labour is likely to be lost, or end in colossal disaster.
The sapta-bhangi method owes its origin to the need for perfect investigation of the nature of things from all possible points of view, in the course of which seemingly but not really contradictory statements will have to be made. The Jaina system is known as the Syādvāda metaphysics because of its many-sided (anekāntic) investigation and of the recourse to the chart of reconciliation, syat S is P, syat S is not P, and the rest.
It should be remembered that for a real contradiction the affirmation and denial of a thing will have to proceed from the one and the same point of view.
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