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Jaina Perspective in Philosophy and Religion
seven Nayas may be in short called the heptagonic forms of our ontological enquiry? or one-sided method of comprehension of seven kinds. In fact there may be as many kinds of Nayas as there are modes of speech.3
Full knowledge of all characters even of a particle of dust cannot be claimed by anyone of us, because of our limitation and bias for a particular angle of vision.4 Truth is relative to our standpoint. We cannot affirm or deny anything absolutely of any object owing to the endless complexity of things. Being is not of a persistent unalterable nature. Every statement of a thing is necessarily one sided and incomplete.5 A thing may be true or untrue or partake of both while being neither. 6 The ordinary human being cannot rise above the limitations of his senses; so his apprehension of reality is partial and valid only from a particular point of view. Thus Nayavāda is an unique instrument of analysis.? Seven Nayas and their Fallacies
Naigam Nayas or non-distinguished regards object as possessing both the general and the specific properties, because no one can live without the other8; all objects possess two
1. Epitome of Jainism, Ch. III. 2. Nyāyāvatāra, Sloka 29. 3. "Frag4T 4TTET TE a fa TuaTOT", FOIETC#57ti 4. Nathmal Tatia : Nayas, etc. p. 192. 5. Encyclopaedia Britannica, Vol. 12, p. 867, 14th. Ed. 6. Encyclopaedia of Religion & Ethics, Vol. I, p. 262, Ed, by
Hoerunle. 7. A. N. Upadhye : Silver Jubliee, Vol. I, Jainism (Article ),
p. 134. 8. ( 4 ) ATAUTO af naachat FHI निविशेष न सामान्यं विशेषोऽपि तद्विना ॥
नयकणिका, श्लोक ५ (a) 7 + 7 + 7 = Not + One + Aspece.
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