Pramanas And Language Dispute Between Dinnaga Dharmakirti And Akalanka

SR No.: 269198
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Piotr Balcerowicz
Publisher: Piotr Balcerowicz
Publication Year: 2005
Total Pages: 58
Language: English
Classification: Article
File Size: 5 MB

Page 53

A DISPUTE BETWEEN DINNĀGA, DHARMAKĪRTI AND AKALANKA 395
thought. How such interpretations may have eventually wiped out the legacy of the preceptor whose works underwent such a thoroughgoing interpretative treatment can best be illustrated by the relation between Dharmakirti and Dinnāga. In contradistinction to that, Prabhācandra's commentary did not override Akalanka's oeuvre.
cognitive criteria (pramana)
indirect cognition (parokşa)
direct cognition (pratyaksa)
testimonial (mediated) cognition(sruta)
clairvoyance (avadhi) primary perception
mind-coading (manah-parydya) (mukhya-pratyaksa) L
absolute knowledge (kevala) conventional perception (sārvyavaharika-pratyaksa)
'scriptural testimony (agama)
non-sensory (mental) perception
(anindriya-pratyaksa)
sensory perception (indriya-pratyaksa)
sensory cognition (indriya-pratyaksa)
memory (smrti) recognition (pratyabhijfāna) suppositional knowledge (aha / tarka)
inference ['for oneself)
(svartha-]-anumana)
memory (mati = smrti) recognitive cognition (sarja) association (cinta) determined cognition (abhinibodha)
sensation (avagraha) cogitation (tha) perceptual judgement (apaya) retention (dhärand)
verbal cognition (nama-yojant)
pre-verbal cognition
(prdn nama-yojanat) Model 4
As we could see from the above, the development of Jaina epistemology closely followed innovations in the Buddhist pramāna tradition. Dharmakirti and Dinnāga seem to be primary adversaries who triggered Akalanka's criticism and provoked him to reformulate several of his concepts. The influence the Buddhist philosophers exercised on Akalanka and other prominent Jaina thinkers was undeniable. That should not however lead one to believe that Akalanka's thought was somehow inferior to the sources of his intellectual inspiration, certainly not less than Dinnāga's or Dharmakirti's systems who ingeniously applied for instance Bharthari's ideas in their original philosophical edifice. Akalanka availed himself of borrowed ideas in a highly creative, sophisticated and independent manner; his categorisations of