Book Title: ISJS Jainism Study Notes E5 Vol 04
Author(s): International School for Jain Studies
Publisher: International School for Jain Studies
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Sat dravyalaksa amo
i.e. dravya / substance is the characteristics / indicator of reality (existent). What is real is substance. Now the question arises what is reality / sat? He then proceeds to say the following in this regard:
Utp da-vyaya-dhrauvyayukta sat 5
i.e. reality is with origination - destruction and permanence. As per Jain philosophy, all objects/ entities in this cosmos, whether sentient or insentient, are with origination-destruction-permanence characteristics i.e. substance / dravya is with origination - destruction and permanence simultaneously. New form of an entity is called its origination; giving up its old state is called destruction and the continuation of the nature of the substance is permanence; e.g. destruction of the state of milk results in origination of the state curd and the continuation of its being dairy product i.e. a bye product of cow (go-rasa) for use by us continues its existence. This way each and every entity in this cosmos goes through origination-destruction-permanence continuously at every moment. Hence all these entities are termed as substance and are real /sat.
Besides reality /existent, another characteristic in Jain philosophy of substance is that it is always with attributes and modes (pary ya) as given by Um Sv ti in the following S tra.
Gu aparyayavad dravayam?
Those parts of the substance, which co-exists with it, are called attributes (gu a) and those that occur serially (krama) are called modes (pary ya). There is no entity in this cosmos, which is not always accompanied with attributes and modes. Knowledge, intuition, happiness etc are the attributes of living beings while mind-based knowledge, verbal testimony etc are the modes of knowledge. Similarly form, taste, odour and touch are the attributes of matter (pudgala) and black / white /yellow etc are the modes of attribute colour.
Thus we conclude that dravya is what is real and real is with origination-destruction and permanence or with attributes and modes.
Jain texts use the word dravya primarily to represent substance. However we also find the terms like object (artha), thing (pad rtha), object of knowledge (jñeya or prameya) etc. 'aryate gamyate parichidyate v eti arthah' i.e. the entity cognized is the object. Similarly all other terms used are with the object of acquiring knowledge about them. Dravya is also called existent (vastu) as 'vasanti guh yasmin tat vastu' or an entity in which attributes exist is called substance.
2.2 Number / quantity of dravyas. There are infinite substances in this cosmos which can all be classified in six categories namely:
Jva: Living being Pudgala: Matter / Mattergy Dharma: Principle of motion Adharma: Principle of rest ka: Space Kla: Time
It is significant to know that most of the philosophies of the world talk of Mono-ism or advaitv da i.e. only one type of existence and everything emanating from it. But Jain philosophy talks of duality of existence / reality i.e. it propagates Duopoly of existence of living and non-living beings. Jains say that both living beings as well as non-living beings are existent and hence eternal truth and not imaginary or pseudo-reality. Similarly knowledge and object of knowledge, eternal and temporary, soul and supreme soul etc are all existent and real.
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STUDY NOTES version 4.0
