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THE AGE OF LOGIC
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attack on it; as a result, it tended to appear as if they were less vehement in their criticism of Kūtasthanityatvavāda than in that of Kşanikasada. A real balance could be maintained only after Advaitavedanta with its advocacy of Kuțasthanityatvavāda - appeared on the scene in full force — but in Haribhadra's time that day was somewhat far off. That is why in Anekāntajay apataka we have just a passing criticism of Kufasthanityatvavada (in chapter II) and repeated criticism of Kșanikavāda (in chapters II and VI). Another historical circumstance also deserves consideration in this connection. Dharmakirtians would conduct a good part of their ontological discussion with the framework of epistemological problems. For instance, they would argue that a particular is real and a universal false inasmuch as perception reveals the former and not the laiter. And since Haribhadra takes into consideration this total argument of the Buddhists his third chapter which is devoted to the problem of the general vs. the particular is most often dealing with epistemological matters; (and in spite of its vast bulk the chapter is unbalanced inasmuch as it contains no more than an inci. dental reference to the view that represents the other extreme, viz. the Nyāya. Vaišeșika view). In the fourth chapter which is devoted to the problem of describability vs. indescribability the Buddhist case deals with purely epistemological matters the Sabdadvaitavādin's case with epistemologicalcum-ontological one).
Keeping this historical background in mind it will be found that the first chapter of Anekāntajayapatākā, even not much big, is of a most funda. mental importance. For here Haribhadra first enumerates all the objections in answer to which the six chapters of his text are written and then answers the first objection. This objection relates to the problem of existence vs. non-existence and consists in urging that existence and non-existence cannot characterise a thing at one and the same time. To be sure, this is the most fundamental objection against the doctrine of Anekāntavāda and has been treated as such by Haribhadra. Haribhadra's simple answer to it is that a thing exists as a particular substance, as occupying a particular position in space, as lasting for a particular period of time, as possessing a particular set of properties while it does not exist as any other substance, as occupying any other position in space, as lasting for any other period of time, as possessing any other set of properties - which, in turn, means that it is characterised by existence in its former capacity and by non-existence in the latter. Now this sort of formulation the Jaina theore. ticians had been making ever since the days of Bhagavati which had de. clared that a thing is a 'self from the standpoint of its own properties and
Aot-self' from that of the alien ones and on the face of it it seems to be a trivial formulation. But the new thing about it is that in the age of Logic it led the Jaina theoreticians to propound the general doctrine of what
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