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JAINAS ON TESTIMONY
147
The Jaina logicians maintain that words enable us to know not only the intention of the speaker but external things also. The mere ground that the knowledge through words does not, at times, correspond to facts is not sufficient to establish that all knowledge through words is such and that words could not enable us to know things at all. They observe that if this be the reason for the Buddhist logician's acceptance of the position that words do not enable us to know things and that they enable us to know only the intentions of the speakers, they are labouring under a misapprehension because, sometimes, words, as in the case of gotraskhalana (mistake of pronouncing a different family name from the intended one) etc., are not used by the speaker according to his intention to convey some particular information and hence knowledge derived through words would not then correspond even to his intention to convey some particular information. But the Buddhist logicians deem it possible to know the intention through words inspite of the fact that all words are not used in accordance with the intention of the speaker Similarly, they should recognise the possibility to know things through words even though all words do not describe the things as they are. Again, those who think that words enable us to know intentions only have to face an inconsistency when they state that Sugata is an authority as his words are true to facts, while others are not so as their words are not in accordance with facts, as also when they determine as to what statements are necessary for proving the fact syllogistically and what statements are not necessary for that.47 This shows that the Jainas, like the Naiyāyikas, maintain emphatically that words lead to the knowledge of things directly.
But the question remains as to whether this knowledge of things derived through words is inferential. The Jaina logicians do not regard this knowledge to be a case of inference. The reasons given by them are as follow : (1) The objects of inference and testimony are not identical. The object of testimony is an unqualified thing while that of inference is the thing qualified by an attribute desired to be proved in it.48 (2) Even their causes are not identical. Presence of the middle term in the minor term etc. (pakşadharmatvādi) that are the necessary conditions of an inference are not applicable in the case of testimony.49 (3) The relation that obtains between the probans and the probandum is different from the one that obtains between a word and its object because the former relation necessitates the physical presence of the
| SR No. | 006972 |
| Book Title | Indian Philosophy |
| Original Sutra Author | N/A |
| Author | Nagin J Shah |
| Publisher | Sanskrit Sanskriti Granthmala |
| Publication Year | 1998 |
| Total Pages | 162 |
| Language | English |
| Classification | Book_English |
| File Size | 14 MB |