________________
Properties of Matter
165
touch-sensibles possessing impact or pressure (frana) as their characteristic property; they constitute air-element by aggregation; the fire-atoms are colour and touch-sensibles with heat as their characteristic property, and constitute fire-element by aggregation; the water-atoms are taste, colour, and touchsensibles having a characteristic viscosity and they constitute water element by combination, and the earth-atoms are smell, taste, colour, and touch-sensibles possessing a characteristic property of dryness or roughness of hardness (kharatva) and constitutes earth-element. 1 Here the Vaišesika influence is evidently felt on the later Vaibhāșika conception of properties of Matter.
KINDS OF PROPERTIES OF RŪPA (MATTER)
Colour : According to the Vaibhāsikas, there are stated to be four kinds of primary colour, namely, blue, red, yellow and white and there are eight kinds of secondary colours of cloud, vapour, dust, dew (mihika), shadow, heat, light and darkness respectively. Black colour does not find mention in the list of primary colours as it is found in Jaina Philosophy. And shape is of eight kinds, viz. long, short, round, spherical, high and low, even and uneven. Thus there are twenty kinds of Rûpa (colour and shape).2 Spherical and round shapes are common to both Jaina and Buddhist Metaphysics, the former 1. Kāme astadravyakośabdaḥ paramāņuranindriyaḥ,
AB h. K., II. 22; rūpa-rasa-gandha-sparsa iti cattvāri dravyāni-pşthivyaptejo vāyu, iti catvāri, also kharasnehoşneraņā svabhāvāni bhūtāni, Abh., K. Spht.; Bhūtāni prthividhāturaptejovāyudhātvah dhștyādikarmasamsiddbāḥ, kharasnehosnateraņāḥ, Abh. K., 1. 12. Vide the Positive Sciences of the Ancient Hindus,
pp. 92-93. 2. Rūpam dvidhā viņģatidhā, Abh., K., 1. 10.
Jain Education International
For Private & Personal Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org
