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Debate and Independent Reasoning vs. Tradition:
On the Precarious Position of Early Nyaya
KARIN PREISENDANZ, Vienna
Already in the Vedic period the Indian intellectual tradition displays an unusually high capacity for systematic and analytical thinking which it applies to various areas of human concern. It suffices to mention two prominent examples in core areas of interest: in the religious sphere, the so-called speculations of the Brahmana-s which, following OLDENBERG's designation, deserve to be styled a "pre-scientific science," and in the linguistic sphere, initially subservient to religious and ritual purposes, the sophisticated analysis of the Sanskrit language as we encounter it in full bloom in Panini's famous grammar, where analysis is augmented by the achievement of the creation of an artificial language. Also reaching back to the Vedic period is the practice of public or semi-public debate on initially only religious, later also philosophical and other topics, a practice which led to the development of special cristic and dialectical traditions, this development in turn was closely interwoven with the development of the systematic philosophical traditions of the classical period. As these traditions evolved in mutual dialectical interaction, their epistemology and logic being continuously refined in the course of philosophical analysis, reason and religious tradition assumed a relationship of actual or potential confrontation, at times even one of opposition, or at least such was supposed by some.
The orthodox" brahmanical tradition now had to react to this situation and first of all define its attitude towards the employment of the various refined instru ments and methods of reasoning as well as towards those who employed them -
orthodox" being used here as a convenient abbreviation to differentiate from the 50called heterodox traditions. i.e.. the Buddhist and Jain traditions. The thinkers of the
1 am indebted to Eli Franco for his careful reading of this paper and his valuable construc tive criticism, and to Anne MacDonald for her insightful remarks.
CE. OLDENBERG 1919. Cf. most recently STAAL 1995, 101-109
Festschrift Minoru Hara (2000), S. 221-251