Illuminator of Jaina Tenets

Author(s): Tulsi Acharya
Publisher: Jain Vishva Bharati

Page 17

INTRODUCTION II. SUBSTANCF, QUALITIES, MODES
-DRAVYA, GUŅA, PARYĀYA A substance has been defined as the substratum of qualities and modes. The qualities and modes cannot be imagined as attributes without any support. Such support is the substance. The qualities are the attributes that are the permanent features of a substance, whereas the modes are the passing features of it. The relation between a substance and its qualities has been thoroughly discussed in all the branches of Indian philosophy. .
The problem of the relation between a substance and its attributes received the serious attention of all western philosophers too since the time of Aristotle. Various criteria of substance are found in Aristotle's works. These criteria are embodied in the notions of substance as (i) the concrete individual, (ii) a core of essential properties, (iii) what is capable of independent existence, (iv) a centre of change, (v) a substratum, and (vi) a logical subject. The crucial issue however is whether there is an independent entity underlying the sensible attributes. We perceive qualities and modes but do we perceive the substratum underlying those qualities?
Kaņāda defines substance as that which possesses qualities and actions, and is an inherent cause. . The most important part of this definition is the concept of substance as the inherent or material cause (samavāyi-kārana). An effect must have a substratum and this substratum is necessarily a substance. Umāsvāti defines dravya (substance) as that which is possessed of guņas (qualities) and paryāyas (modes). And subsequently he defines a guna as that which has substance as its substratum and is not itself the substratum of any other quality. Here substance and quality are defined as relative to each other so that the explanation is circular and tautologous : qualities are what qualify substances and substances are what have qualities. But at another place Umăsvāti gives a definition of substance which avoids this fallacy of circularity. Here substance is defined as what is existent (sat, real) and the existent is defined as what is subject to origination, cessation and continuity. A substance, according to this definition, is a real that endures through its different transformations and transmutations. In other words, that aspect of a real is substance which never ceases to 1 TSū, V. 37. 2 Ibid., V. 40. 3 Sarvārthasiddhi, V. 29-30 : sad dravyalakşaņam; utpāda-vyaya-dhrauvya-yuktam
sat.