Fundamentals Of Jainism

Author(s): Champat Rai Jain
Publisher: Veer Nirvan Bharti

Page 12

FUNDAMENTALS OF JAINISM
since there are no air-tight compartments to kecp these elemerts separate from each other, and since the world-process is the result of the interaction and functioning of the different substances and elements, it follows that no starting point can be discovered for a general commencement of the universe. This amounts to saying that the idea of a creation is altogether untenable in philosophy.
SAPTABHANGI SYSTEM
We now come to the philosophy of stand-points which is the first step in secientific metaphysics. Any one who has at all bestowed a thought on the nature of philosophy must have arrived at the conclusion that it aims at the perfection of knowledge to emancipate humanity from the slavery of superstition and awe of nature's might, and that knowledge itself signifies nothing other than a sense of familiarity with the nature of things as they exist in the world. Now, everything in nature exists in relation to a number of other things, and is liable to be influenced by them in different ways. Besides, all things present different aspects when looked at from the point of view of their nature and when studied in respect of the forms they assume under the influence of some other thing or things. Furthermore, when they are described by men they are generally described from a particular point of view, though thc unwary are led to imagine this one-sided description of their nature as exhaustive, many even falling into thc pitfall of logical 'suicide' by basing their deductions on a set of rules or formulas which are applicable to facts gleaned from a particular stand-point, but not to any other. We can observe for ourselves the nature of confusion which is likely to result from an ignoring or mixing up of different stand-points by means of the two following ilustrations :
(1) Let us take for our first illustration the famous text, Jiva is Brahman' (soul is God), which certain peoplo preach without the least possible qualification. But obviously the statement is true only in so far as the natural qualities of the soul are concerned; it is not truc in respect of the present manifested condition of an ordinary jīva who must exert himself in the right