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Philosophy of the Rāmānuja School of Thought [CH.
chances of error are eliminated by other sources the original validity stands uncontradicted.
Saprakāśatva (self-luminosity). Rāmānujācārya first states the Naiyayika objection against self-luminosity. The Naiyāyikas are supposed to argue that things are existent but they become knowable only under certain conditions and this shows that existence (satta) is different from cognition or its self-illumination (prakāśa). Arguing from the same position it may be said that knowledge as an existent entity is different from its illumination as such1. If knowledge itself were self-revealing, then it would not depend upon any conditioning of it by its contiguity or relationing with objects and as such any individual cognition would mean universal cognition. If, on the other hand, knowledge requires a further conditioning through its relationing with objects, then knowledge would not be self-revealing. Further, knowledge being partless, there cannot be any such conception that one part of it reveals the other. In the case of partless entities it is not possible to conceive that knowledge should be self-revealing, for it cannot be both an agent and an object at the same time. Again, if knowledge were self-revealing, then the difference between consciousness and its re-perception through introspection cannot be accounted for. Further, it must be remembered that the difference between one cognition and another depends upon the difference of its objective content. Apart from this there is no difference between one cognition and another. If the objective content was not a constituent of knowledge, then there would be no difference between the illumination of knowledge as such and the illumination of an object. If knowledge were by itself self-illuminating, then there would be no place for objects outside it and this would bring us to absolute idealism. So the solution may be either on the Mīmāmsā lines that knowledge produces such a character in the objective entity that by that cognized character of objects cognition may be inferred, or it may be on Nyāyā lines that knowledge manifests the objects. Thus it has to be admitted that there must be some kind of cognitive relation between the object and its knowledge, and it would be the specific nature of these relations that would determine the cognitive character in each case. Now it may again be asked whether this cognitive relation is only object-pointing or
1 sarvasya hi svataḥ sva-gocara-jñānā-dhīnaḥ prakāśaḥ samvidām api tathai'va abhyupagantum ucitaḥ. Nyaya-kulisa. MS.
