Jain Journal 2004 04

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

Page 44

SATYA RANJAN BANERJEE:ANEKANTAVADA AND LANGUAGE
245
According to pure logic, these oppositions are exclusive of one another and they cannot be combined in any one substratum. The opposition is absolute and unconditional. This may be called the absolutistic logic. The Jaina is a non-absolutistic, and so also all philosophers like the Sāṁkhya, the Vaiseșika, the Mimāṁsist and the non-monistic schools of Vedānta are non-absolutistics in as much as they do not believe in the absolute opposition of the logical extremes e.g, being and non being, eternal and non-eternal, and so on. According to the Jainas, opposition is understandable only in the light of experience. We know that light and darkness are opposed, because we do not see them together. No apriori knowledge of such opposition is possible. Accordingly the non-absolutist contends that if being and non-being are found together, and this finding is not contradicted by subsequent experience. We must conclude that there is no opposition between them. In other words, one is not exclusive of the other. We have seen a jar existing in its place and not existing in another. Existence and non-existence are thus both predicable of the jar. The concept of change or becoming involves that a thing continues and maintains its identity in spite of its diversity of qualities. The unbaked jar is black, becomes red when baked and yet continues as the jar. The Jaina thus maintains in strict conformity with the dictates of experience, that all reals are possessed of a nature which is not determinable in the light of formal logic. Everything is eternal as substance, but perishable qua modes. The Jaina does not consider the Naiyāyika to be sound logically when he makes substance and modes different entities which however are somehow brought together by a relation called samavāya (inherence). But inherence as an independent relation is only a logical makeshift which will not work."
In the end we can thus sum up the entire discussion about anekānta in the succint language of Ācārya Mahāprajña who in his book Anekānta in Hindi (translated into English by Mrs Sudhamahi Regunathan by the name of Anekānta, the third Eye) has said that our life is based on opposing pairs. The English translation says----
"Anekanta has one rule: co-existence of opposites. Not only is existence in pairs, they have to be opposing pairs. In the entire world of nature, in the entire universe of existence, opposing pairs exist. If there is wisdom there is ignorance. If there is vision there is lack of it