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ON BUDDHIST NIRVANA
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relative identity as between the cause-continuum and the effectcontinuum. One mode cannot be absolutely different from another as there runs through them one and the same substance, a situation which makes possible the psychical phenomena of recognition and memory. There arises a question as to the precise sense in which a substance can be said to be permanent (dhruva), for we have been told that it itself changes in a way or that it is identical with its modes in a way. The Jaina thinkers say that a substance is permanent in the sense that it never loses its essence and not in the sense that it is absolutely static. It undergoes change no doubt but it retains its essential nature; it is in this sense that it can be said to be permanent - not in the senses of being absolutely changeless. From this it follows that reality is dynamic, it is always in motion, in flux, it always every moment transforms itself without giving up its essence. The process of transformation involves origination, decay and persistence. Hence reality is said to be of this triple nature.
One may find hard to conceive a thing which is both permanent and changing. The idea seems to be that in an element there are two aspects - one static and the other dynamic. But how can it be visualized that some parts of an element remain static when others are changing ? For, certainly all these parts are organically related with one another and they form a unity. It is impossible to point out physically a static part in an element. To avoid this difficulty the Jaina thinkers might say that what is called a static part of an element is not really static but that the element undergoes “homogeneous change with respect to this part. But then we have to point out that the expression 'homegeneous change' involves a contradiction in terms. It seems that in Jaina philosophy permanence has negative connotation. It means 'not to cross certain limits in the course of change'.
There are certain limits that an element can never transgress in the course of change. A thing, under appropriate conditions, can change itself into any other thing, provided the latter is not primarily and essentially of a different nature. That a material thing can change itself into any material thing through proper processes but it can never change itself into a conscious entity, is an illustration in point. Viewed in this way, the Jaina theory
