Book Title: Facets of Jain Philosophy Religion and Culture
Author(s): Shreechand Rampuriya, Ashwini Kumar, T M Dak, Anil Dutt Mishra
Publisher: Jain Vishva Bharati
________________
338 Anekāntavāda and Syädvāda
.....Based upon this principle is the doctrine of saptabhangi, the seven modes of predication. In order to speak of some-thing in relation to its own substance or locality, time or mode, negation or năsti is to be used. If both the aspects are to be spoken of, then both asti and nāsti are to be used, but one after another. Again, if both the aspects, affirmative and negative, in the same predication, are to be expressed, it becomes inexpressible by language—it is avaktavya. These are the four initial modes of predication in the group of saptabhangi. By attaching the fourth term 'avaktavya' to each of the first three, we arrive at the seven modes of predication : asti, năsti, asti-năsti, avaktavya, asti-avaktavya, nästi-avaktavya, and asti-năsti-avaktavya. These are the only seven possible modes of predication that we can have.40
40. Kalidas Bhattacharyya, ed., op. cit., pp. 428-429. For a more austere statement of
the doctrine in classical terms see Wolfgang Beurlen, tr., op. cit., pp164-165 : The sapta-bhangi says that an object (a ghata, of course) seen from a chosen standpoint (syät) can be signified (1) as existent, (2) as non-existent and (3) as both existent and non-existent (the former seen under its own aspect and the latter under alien ones). The three corresponding formulae are : syāa asty eva, syän nästy eva, syad asti năsti ca. The two statements of (3), however, can be made by letting the one follow the other, whereas they cannot possibly be made simultaneously. Under this aspect the object (ghata) (4) defies description : syadavaktavva eva. The remaining three sentences are identical with the first three by adding avaktavya. This means to say in sentence (5) that a thing exists but that, apart from this positive quality with reference to another thing. It has a negative quality as well, and that it is impossible to express both qualities simultaneously : Syad asti căvaktavvaś ca. Sentence (6): syän nästi cāvaktavyacaś is just the reverse on the basis of non-existence. Sentence (7), finally, ca expresses that an object as in (3) can be taken either as positive or negative, though not simultaneously but only successively : svād asti nästi cāvaktavyaś ca. The wording rendered follows Vimaladasa's Saptabhangītarangiņi (p.2); except for some slight difference it represents the backbone of the Syädvāda literature'.
