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JAINA PHILOSOPHY : AN INTRODUCTION
awareness of the generic form is intuition and the comprehension of the specific characters is knowledge. The knowledge-obscuring karma and the intuition-obscuring karma obstruct these faculties. Because of the presence of these two, people like us are not in a position to possess intuition and knowledge in all perfection. There is no reason why the universal and the particular should be revealed only in alternate. succession and not simultaneously when the two types of karma are destroyed simultaneously due to a particular kind of purification of the self.' Successive Occurrence of Intuition and Knowledge :
Now, we proceed to the problem of the successive occurrence of intuition and knowledge in the omniscient. Jinabhadra is a great advocate of this view. He has very elaborately dealt with the problem in his Viseșāvaśyaka-bhāsya and Visesanavatī. He has mentioned all the three positions and advanced arguments for and against all of them. His own opinion is in favour of the successive occurrence, since he sincerely recognises the validity of the scriptural texts. He argues that if perfect intuition and perfect knowledge are identical and not separate, what is the sense in recognising two separate veils of karma, viz., intuition-obscuring karma and knowledgeobscuring karma ? Moreover, the scriptural conception of five types of knowledge and four types of intuition is condemned by those who are not prepared to accept the successive occurrence of intuition and knowledge. The view of the simultaneous occurrence of intuition and know-ledge is also invalid, since two conscious activities cannot occur at the same instant. Now, the opponent may argue that the simultaneous occurrence of the two in the imperfect is not possible, since he is under the influence of the veil of obstructive karma and thus not completely free from it, but in the case of the perfect 1. Aștasahasri on Apta-mimāmsā, 101. 2. Višeşāvaśyaka-bhāsya, 3093. 3. Višeşāvasyaka-bhâsya, 3096.
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