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absence of sense-organs and that therefore in this state it should be non-knower, remains unanswered. The answer to this is that the instruments of knowledge, sense-organ, etc. are corporeal so they cannot be the agents in the act of perceiving or cognising, they are merely windows-instruments -opening out on knowledge; it is the soul that is the agent of the act of knowing. Even when the sense-organs stop functioning, the soul has knowledge of the type of memory, etc.; and even when the sense-organs are functioning the soul may not have knowledge if it is absent-minded. Positive and negative concomitance of knowledge is with reference to the soul and not with reference to the sense-organs. So it is not true to say, that the emancipated soul is non-knower or has no knowledge because there is no sense-organ then. The soul perceives through the windows of the senses as Devadatta would through the windows of his house. But if Devadatta were to leave the house and gaze out in the open, his vision would be very much enhanced, so when the soul is free from the sense-organs when the body perishes, it is able to know all things without being obstructed (1995-6).
The soul can in fact never be devoid of knowledge, since knowledge is its essential nature, as an atom cannot be devoid of form, etc. (corporeality). Hence to say that the emancipated soul exists and that it is devoid of knowledge is to contradict oneself. A thing cannot exist if its essential nature is lost. It has just been explained that a thing having a particular genus cannot be transformed so as to come into possession of a different. genus altogether; the soul can never be jada (insentient). Thus the soul can never be a non-knower (1997).
One would lose all patience if he were questioned as to how it could be determined that the soul is of the nature of knowledge, for this is something that can be known from experience. As said above, the soul can remember things cognised earlier with the sense-organs, even when these sense-organs are not function
See Gathas 1657-1660
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