Jain Journal 1999 04

Author(s): Jain Bhawan Publication
Publisher: Jain Bhawan Publication

Page 9

VIDYABHUSANA : UMĀSVĀTI
127
śruta, for these are acquired by the soul through the medium of the senses and the mind. Knowledge which is attained by Yoga (concentration) in its three stages of avadhi, manahparyāya and kevala-is a species of Pratyaksa, direct knowledge, because it is acquired by the soul not through the medium of the senses.
Umāsvāti contends that inference (Anumāna), comparison (Upamāna), verbal testimony or reliable authority (Agama), presumption (Arthāpatti), probability (Sambhava), and non-existence (Abhāva), are not separate sources of valid knowledge : he includes them under Paroksa (indirect knowledge). According to his theory the majority of them are the result of the contact of the senses with the objects which they apprehend; and some of them are not sources of valid knowledge at all.
It is interesting to note that according to Umāsvāti and the earlier Jaina philosophers all sense-perceptions (visual perception, auditory perception, etc.) are indirect apprehensions, in as much as the soul acquires them not of itself but through the medium of the senses. The words Paroksa and Pratyakşa are thus used by these authors in senses quite opposite to those which they bear in Brāhmanic logic and in the later Jaina Logic.6
2. UMĀSVĀTI'S EXPLANATION OF NAYA
(THE MOOD OF STATEMENTS) Naya, the method of description or mood of statements.
5. In the bhāsya on aphorism 12, of Chapter 1 of the Tattvārthādhigama
sūtra. Umāsvāti observes : anumāno'pamānāgamartha-patti-sambhavā-bhāvān api ca pramānāniti kecin manyante tat katham etad iti atro'cyate-sarvānyetāni mati-śrutayor antarbhūtāni indriyārtha-sannikarşa-nimittatvät.
(Tattvārthādhigama-sūtra, p. 15). In his bhāsya on 1-6 of the Tattvārthādhigama-sūtra, Umāsvāti observes: caturvidham ityeke. (Tattvārthādhigama-sūtra, p. 9). In his bhāsya on 1-35 he mentions the four Pramāṇas thus : yathā vā pratyaksā'numāno'pamānā-pta-vacanaiḥ pramānair eko'rthaḥ pramiyate sva-visaya-niyaman na ca tā vipratipattayo bhavanti tadvan nayavādā iti.
(Tattvārthādhigama-sütra, p. 35). These four kinds of Pramana seem to refer to those in the Nyāya-Sūtra of the Hindu logician Aksapāda. But the same four kinds are also referred to as sub-divisions of Hetu in the Sthānanga Sutra of the Jainas, p. 309, published by Dhanapat Singh and printed in Calcutta. Here Paroksa stands for samvyavahārika pratyaksa while Pratyaksa for pāramarthika pratyaksa (vide Pramāņa-naya-tattvālokālankāra, chapter II).