Central Philosophy of Jainism Anekanta Vada

Author(s): Bimal Krishna Matilal, Nagin J Shah, Dalsukh Malvania
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

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The Central Philosophy of Jainism
comparison. For, despite the obvious parallelism between some cryptic pronouncements of Wittgenstein and some statements of the Buddha, the latter preached a definite goal-oriented doctrine (the four noble truths ) and a definite way (to achieve the goal of Nirvāņa ). But it may be difficult to construe Wittgenstein's philosophic motivations to be leading man towards such a goal as Nirvana. The Buddha, for example, was definitely and seriously concerned with the human suffering (duhkha) and the "conditioned-ness' of human existence. Thus, if the metaphysical assumptions, such as that of a soul, create and perpetuate suffering, they, accoring to the Buddha, should better be avoided. But one sees Wittgenstein as one who tried to destroy our intellectual confusion created by our philosophic jargons and metaphysical beliefs.
Jayatilleke, however, points out the difference between the Buddha and the Logical Positivists in a different manner (p. 475-6) :
"It is necessary, however, to draw a distinction between the solution of the Logical Positivists and that of the Buddhist. The Buddhist while saying that (it) is meaningless to ask whether one exists in, does not exist in, is born in, is not born in, Nirvana, still speaks of such a transcendent state as realizable. The meaninglessness of these questions is thus partly due to the inadequacy of the concepts contained in them to refer to this state......... The transempirical cannot be empirically described or understood but it can be realized and attained." (Italics mine).
It is difficult to support the above contention. Jayatilleke seems to be suggesting here, following probably the lead of T.R. V. Murti29, that the Buddha, by not answering the avyākata questions tried to impress upon us about the poverty of our language apparatus as well as the consequent ineffability of the "transcendental truth". The Buddha, in my opinion, was seldom eager to teach his disciple about what was called the transcendental truth. Much less can it be said that he believed in any sort of transcendental truths. There is evidence to show that the Buddha was against the mystical teachings which talked about the highest bliss (ekānta-sukha) and other unverifiable (unspecifiable) pronouncen:ents. We can thus refer to the Janapadakalyāņi-sutta of the Dighanikaya I.95 :
“The Buddha continues : Just as if a man would say, “I desire and am infatuated by the beauty-queen of this land." And people would ask him: “Well, friend, do you know whether this beautyqueen of the land, whom you desire and wish to make love to, is a Ksatriyi by caste, or a Brāhmani, or a Vaišyi or a Sudri ?"