Book Title: Istopadesa The Golden Discourse
Author(s): Vijay K Jain
Publisher: Vikalp

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Page 144
________________ Verse 50 jñāna or knowledge. The second Naya is vyavahāra for the reason stated above and sadbhūta for the same reason and upacārita because the epithet is figurative and transferred. When we speak of jñāna or knowledge as Pramāņa or the criterion of truth we are thinking of the objects of knowledge or artha. Artha itself may be spoken of as a manifestation of knowledge or jñāna-vikalpa. To speak of artha or the object as a manifestation of knowledge is only figuratively true in the case of external objects. These being physical in nature are acetana and yet as objects of knowledge may be spoken of as manifestation of jñāna. What intrinsically belongs to the self is transferred to the object because of the relation brought about by the process of knowledge. The third Naya is anupacārita asadbhūta vyavahāra. The only term that demands explanation is asadbhūta here. It refers to the identification of the Self with some alien properties. For example, to consider one's own body as oneself which is generally done in ordinary life is Asadbhūta Vyavahāra. This is not merely figurative as the statement is sanctioned by the intimate interrelation that exists between the soul and the body. Hence 'This body is mine,' or 'I am this,' pointing to the body is justified according to anupacarita asadbhūta vyavahāra nava. The last Nava is the upacārita form of the same. Here the alien quality or the thing with which the self is identified lacks that intimate relation that exists between the soul and the body. To call the ornaments as one's own, to claim certain individuals as one's relatives, to possess certain things as one's own property, in short, to identify one's personality with alien things and persons is possible only in a figurative sense. Each personality is distinct from and alien to the others, though all by coexisting together may partake of common environment and enter into definite relations. Still from the metaphysical point of view, one's 127

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