First Steps to Jainism Part 2

Author(s): Sancheti Asso Lal, Manakmal Bhandari
Publisher: Sancheti Trust Jodhpur

Page 73

The Central Philosophy of Jainism-Anekantavad 59
able help has been taken in this article) which is used in the title of this article.
4. For understanding the full meaning of “non-one-sidedness" or anekantavada, one has to understand what is meant by “onesidedness" or Ekant which is denied by this Theory. To a layman the ordinary meaning would appear as holding one side or one view steadfastly. It is well known that with the philosophical development a number of schools of thought developed in India-as anywhere else – like Samkhya, Bauddha, Vedanta, Nyaya and Mimansa. Even before the ideas crystallized in such established schools, thoughts of different types were aired by different thinkers like those seen in the Vedas, Upnishadas and other scriptures. These concerned the various metaphysical propositions like different aspects of reality, soul, universe and others. When such different view points emerged during development of thought, and one school asserted its metaphysical thesis, it was rejected by another school which put forward its own contradictory proposition. Each school mustered arguments in favour of its own thesis and those rejecting the opposite propositions. This verged on dogmatism. So much so that one school refused to entertain the point of view of the other side holding it as false and considering only its own point of view as the gospel-absolute--truth. This led to intolerance. Such dogmatist and intolerant approach is considered "ekant" or one-sided philosophical approach in Jain view and such one-sidedness is considered as equivalent to falsehood or false knowledge and false perception-Mithya Gyan and Mithya Darshan.
5. Anekantavada or the Doctrine of non-onesidedness is negation of or is opposed to the above mentioned Ekant or onesided approach-as the prefix "an" or "non” would suggest. According to the nononesided approach while presenting one's point of view on any subject due consideration is also shown to the opposite point of view. This approach is based on the acceptance of the manifoldness of reality or in other words, acceptance of the fact that every proposition or thesis has many aspects-all of which have some element of truth from different standpoints. As such a philosophical proposition or metaphysical thesis can be true if it is viewed from a particular stand-point. Therefore, the doctrine of non-onesidedness not only tolerates the view point of the opposite side, but also tries to understand the basis or standpoints of the
divergent propositions with a view to reconcile the apparant contra