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details are not perceived, while in the latter the details are also known. In the technical language of Jainism, darśana is known as nirākāra-upayoga, while jñāna is called sākāra-upayoga. 'Before we know a thing in a detailed way, there is the stage where we simply see, hear, or otherwise become conscious of it in a general way, without going into its ins and outs. We simply know it as belonging to a class. This is the first stage of knowledge. It may be called detail-less knowledge or indefinite cognition. If this stage is not experienced, there can be no knowledge of the thing." This statement of Herbert Warren is correct to some extent, because 'to know a thing as belonging to a class' is the first stage of jñāna which arises after darśana. according to some Jaina thinkers. They say that the cognition of a thing as belonging to a class is avagraha jñāna (sensation).2 According to them, darsana is the primitive stage or the first stage of cognition where we are only aware of an object. This simple awareness without any reference to a particularity or generality may be called darsana. In this awareness, the knowledge contains only existence, i.e., 'sattāmātra'. This kind of knowledge originates just after the contact between the subject and the object. This state of cognition is the preceding stage of sensation proper. In other words, according to these thinkers, sensation is divided into two categories or two stages. The first stage where we have only awareness of the object is called darśana (sensation of existence). The second stage where we have sensation of the object as belonging to a class is called jñāna (sensation proper).
There are some thinkers who define darsana as the cognition of generality. Such thinkers regard avagraha (sensation) as a stage of darśana. The difference between darśana and jñāna, however, consists in the fact that in the former the details are not perceived, while in the latter the
1. Jainism, P. 29.
2. Pramāṇa-naya-tattvāloka, II. 7.
3. Sanmati-tarka-prakaraṇa, II.21.
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