Indian Logic Part 03

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

Page 44

VALIDITY OF VEDAS...
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this Jayanta is indulging in the type of speculation characteristic of Advaita Vedāntins is made clear when he next reports that according to Vedāntins not only the act of moral development but even an ordinary Vedic ritual is aimed at self-knowledge.24 Really the Mimāṁsakas and Vedāntins were fanatically committed to maintain two opposite extreme positions, their common point being an endeavour to champion the cause of Vedas in a literal sense of the term. This was not the case with a Naiyāyika whose loyalty to the cause of Vedas was but skin-deep. Thus the Mīmārsaka developed an intricate theology of Vedic ritual making ample use of the original Vedic material while the Vedāntins developed an intricate ontology of Brahman-monism similarly making ample use of the original Vedic material. Naturally, the sheet-anchor of the Mimārsaka were the Brāhmaṇa-texts just as the sheet-anchor of the Vedāntin were the Upanişadic texts, but since both these groups of texts were after all Vedic the problem before the Mimārsaka was how to explain away the Upanisadic texts which had little to do with ritualism just as the problem before the Vedāntin was how to explain away the Brāhmanatexts which had little to do with Brahman-monism. It was in this context that the Mimārsaka sought to prove that even the descriptive Vedic statements are somehow injunctive in character just as the Vedāntin sought to prove that even injunctive Vedic statements are somehow descriptive in character, both were forced endeavours but both were pursued with vigour. However, in the times of Jayanta, Vedānta was not yet the formidable force it became later on, and so it is the Mimārsaka who acts as the chief Vedicist rival for him, though he is also going to undertake a detailed criticism of Brahmanmonism. That is why in the present controversy with the Mimāṁsaka Jayanta introduces the Vedāntin towards the fag end. And though Jayanta seeks some support from the Vedāntin on a point maintained by both in common (and maintained wrongly), the former soon realises that the Vedāntin was as much maintaining an extreme position as the Mimāmsaka. Hence his concluding remark : “Of these two (viz. injunctive and descriptive statements) which is subordinate to which - that question does not interest us much. For we rest content with demonstrating that Vedas as such are an authentic scriptural text."2 Really, of course, Vedas have very little to do with what Jayanta stands for in the field of philosophy as in the field of theology-cum-ritual.