Aptamimansa Critique of an Authority Bhasya

Author(s): Samantbhadracharya, Akalankadev, Nagin J Shah
Publisher: Jagruti Dilip Sheth Dr

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CRITIQUE OF AN AUTHORITY
of seven nayas, occasional application to certain specific cases and his account of dravyāstika and paryāyāstika are interesting." He defines jñānanaya and kriyānaya. He presents three versions of niscayanayavyavahāranaya." His reference to the saptabharigi doctrine is extremely summary and fails to be informative.
Kundakunda's Samayasāra certainly adds a new dimension to the discussion concerning the problem of vyavahāranaya (the standpoint of worldly behaviour) vs. niscayanaya (the transcendental standpoint). His recourse to it is so massive that it startles us. From the transcendental standpoint the soul is independent, self-existent and uncontaminated by matter while from the standpoint of worldly behaviour it is involved in karma as well as in the birth and rebirth cycle. As to view the niscaya-vyavahāra pair in more than one ways is possible, the procedure adopted by Kundakunda was not totally impermissible. But what was un-Jainalike was Kundakunda's declaration that standpoint of worldly behaviour is a totally false standpoint." In his Pañcāstikāya he mentions the fullfledged seven avayavas or bhangas of Saptabhangi.
Samantabhadra laid a firm foundation of Anekāntavāda upon which Akalanka, Vidyānanda and Yasovijaya built a grand superstructure. His Aptamīmārsā which we are going to translate and study in the latter part of this book deserves a special mention in the history of Anekānta philosophy for more reasons than one. The framework worked out in Aptamīmāṁsā for criticising onesided philosophical views proved to be a major helpful model for subsequent authors. Certainly, the task of the Jaina thinkers belonging to the later times was to command mastery over the contemporary systems of philosophy and subject them to criticism mainly in terms of the model provided by Aptamīmāṁsā. The work has a good fortune of being commented on by Akalanka, Vidyānanda and Yaśovijaya. It is meritorious inasmuch as the fundamentals of Anekāntavāda has found in it a most clear-cut formulation. “Samantabhadra had a clear consciousness of what constitutes the central contention of the doctrine of Anekānta, viz. that a thing must be characterised by two mutually contradictory features at one and the same time. He also realised that the doctrine
17. Verses 2180-2274 and verses 414-426 18. Verses 3586-3591 19. vavahāru 'bhūdattho bhūdattho desido suddhanao / Samayasāra, 13