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52: Śramaņa, Vol 62, No. 1 January-March 2011
Before we continue, I feel it is necessary to first defend my above assertion that 'identity in difference'is not a valid definition of a substance. I claimed above that such a definition posits both substance and its modifications. Dr. S.C. Jain seems to agree when he states, “The same entity has to be doubly designated as permanent and impermanent, the substance and the modes."3 Dr. Jain is correct when referring to entities but seems to conflate 'substance' with "thing'. If we are talking about 'things', we must acknowledge that they change. However, if we are defining things (entities such as jīvas) as substances, then we ambiguate the terms ‘substance' and 'thing'. If we were to adopt Dr. Jain's explanation of identity in difference, we would be equating substances with things, and then defining things in terms of substance, or the other way around. Now, to be fair, Dr. Jain finds reason for his position in the Jaina notion of anekāntavāda, a topic too complex to delve into here. Let it be sufficient to know that anekāntavāda remains an inconsistently championed concept in the literature. That is to say, a consensus has not been reached that sufficiently explains the concept."
Now the term “jīva' is ambiguous, referring both to the pure, liberated, jīva and to the obstructed, mundane jiva. The mundane jīvais embodied and bound by karmas whereas the liberated jīvais free of karmas. Mundane jīvas are also said to have extrinsic attributes such as mood, body, and age whereas liberated jīvas do not. Because it is the intrinsic attributes that matter for identity, for the sake of simplicity we will be focusing here on liberated jīva. So what is a jīva? Let us look at what Jaina scholars have had to say about the identity of the jīva.
Dr. Jyoti Prasad Jain identifies the jīva as knowledge itself. This is, however, not precisely the case for Dr. Jain also states that the soul's nature is ahirsā (non-harm).8 Dr. Helmuth Von Glasenapp identifies the jīva in terms of its characteristics. He maintains that the jīva's primary characteristic is cognition but the jiva also has the characteristics of vīrya (energy or activity),to and samyag
| SR No. | 525075 |
| Book Title | Sramana 2011 01 |
| Original Sutra Author | N/A |
| Author | Sundarshanlal Jain, Shreeprakash Pandey |
| Publisher | Parshvanath Vidhyashram Varanasi |
| Publication Year | 2011 |
| Total Pages | 172 |
| Language | Hindi |
| Classification | Magazine, India_Sramana, & India |
| File Size | 15 MB |