Sramana 2001 04

SR No.: 525044
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Shivprasad
Publisher: Parshvanath Vidhyashram Varanasi
Publication Year: 2001
Total Pages: 226
Language: Hindi
Classification: Magazine, India_Sramana, & India
File Size: 9 MB

Page 174

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concern we find Jaina thinkers have adopted some ideas of Nyāya school in toto and some ideas in their modified form. As I have already explained that the doctrine of five fold knowledge has its origin in Lord Paráva's tradition and thus it is prior to even Lord Mahāvīra (6th century B.C.), that is why we do not find any impact of Nyāya school on this doctrine. Even though in Tattvärthasūtra (3rd A.D.), while establishing these five types of knowledge as Pramānas, we do not trace any conceptual impact of these schools on Jaina epistemology. In the beginning of christian era, when in different schools of Indian philosophy the discussions regarding the nature and types of Pramāņas took place, the Jaina thinker Umaswati esablished these five types of knowledges as Pramāņa. Here some one can say that Tattvārthasūtra accepts only two types of Pramāṇas and classify its five types of knowledge into two Pramāṇas-- Pratyakșa (direct) and Parokșa (indirect). This shows an impact of Vaišeșika school on Jaina epistemology but in my humble opinion it would be a wrong supposition, since in this context similarity only regarding the numbers of Pramāṇas and not in the concept itself. For Jainas the knowledge itself is Pramana (FITI HIV), but for Nyāya-Vaišeșikas it is not the knowledge itself, but the sources of valid knowledge are Pramāņas (74d 37 sfa M). Secondly for Umaswati the meaning of Pratyakşa (direct knowledge) and Parokșa (indirect knowledge) is totally different, for him knowledge acquired through sense organs and mind is not a direct knowledge, but it is an indirect knowledge. Though Umaswati had adopted the concept of Pramāņa, which was the prominent concept of epistemological discussions of that time but he explained it according to his own āgamika tradition.
First of all we can trace the impact of Nyāya school on Jaina epistemology in the cannonical works of later period i.e. 3rd-4th century A.D. or in the later added passages of early cannonical works.
It is to be noted that the Jaina theory of pramānas takes it birth from the scattered ideas found in the cannonical works. In the first stage of the five-fold division of the knowledge, which later on considered as pramāṇas also, it remain pure and unalloyed. In the second stage when the idea of two fold classification came into existence, particularly in Niryukti literature and Tattvārthasutra, it was