Indian Logic Part 03

Author(s): Nagin J Shah
Publisher: Sanskrit Sanskriti Granthmala

Page 12

VALIDITY OF VEDAS AND OTHER
SCRIPTURAL TEXTS
In Ahnika (Chapter) IV of his Nyāyamañjari, Jayanta is exclusively preoccupied with theological matters. But the performance, though somewhat unusual for a Nyāya author, was not unexpected. For Jayanta has contended that the central aim of the Nyāya school of philosophy is to vindicate the validity of Vedic testimony, and it is this vindication that he undertakes in some details in his present Ahnika. In this connection Jayanta has to argue not only against the anti-Brahmanical theologians like Buddhists but also against the very much Brahmanical Mīmāṁsā theologians. For in the course of history the Nyāya-Vaiseșika school of philosophy came to be allied with the Purānic-Brahminist school of theology which was staunchly theistic and stood opposed as much to the atheistic Brahmanical Mimāṁsā theology as to all anti-Brahmanical theology. And hence it is that the present Ahnika of Jayanta enables us to form a clear idea of how a Purāņic-Brahmanist would look at the problems of theology. This should become evident from a miere look at the titles of the sections into which this Ahnika might be conveniently divided; they are as follows: . .
(1) Vedas - an authorless composition or a composition by God (2) Atharvaveda on par with the remaining three Vedas (3) The Scriptural texts other than Vedas (4) Objections against Vedas refuted
(5) Equal authenticity of the injunctive as well as descriptive .. parts of Vedas . Here the section (5) takes up an important theoretical problem which however is not considered in much details while section (2) takes up a rather secondary theological problem which somehow divided the Brahmin theologians irrespective of whether they were Purāņists or Mimārsakas; but the remaining three sections elaborately treat problems that are typical as well as crucial. Thus the section- (1) explicitly tells us how the Purāņist differs from the Mimārsaka in