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Jaina Philosophy and Religion is also inexpressible from some other standpoint.'
The remaining three modes are obtained by combining successively each of the first three modes with the fourth. They are as follows:
Though a thing is certainly inexpressible, it is expressible also from other standpoints (Modes I, II and III). So, along with its inexpressibility when we want to present its expressibility also in some form, then the first three modes pertaining to any of the three forms of expressibility (e.g., existence, non-existence, existence-cum-non-existence) get combined with the mode pertaining to inexpressibility.
hus by combining the first and the fourth modes successively we get the fifth mode, “A thing (say, the pot) is certainly existent from a certain standpoint and certainly inexpressible from another standpoint."
Similarly, combining again the second and the fourth modes successively we have the sixth mode, “A thing (say, the pot) is certainly nonexistent from a certain standpoint and certainly inexpressible from another standpoint.”
Lastly, combining successively the third mode with the fourth, we get the seventh mode, “A thing (say, the pot) is certainly existent from a certain standpoint, also is certainly non-existent from another stand and inexpressible from a third standpoint."
A thing has infinite characters. Therefore, it is described as anekānta (manifold) or anekadharmātmaka (having manifold nature). In fact, it is infinitely manifold or its nature is infinitely manifold. If someone takes photographs of a house from all the four directions, then those photographs will not be identical. Even then they are the photographs of the same house, and we consider them to be of the identical house. Though the photographs relate to the identical house, they are different because they are taken from different angles or directions. Similarly, a thing appears varied from different standpoints. This is the only reason why our statements about it are also varied. We know that a particular man now in an elevated or high state was once in a low state or position. And we say: "Now this man is not that man, he has become a great artist or scholar."
noint
POIL,
1. According to the Jaina works on logic, a thing is inexpressible in the sense that the
opposite characters like existence and non-existence, etc., embedded in a thing can never be asserted simultaneously with equal prominence. When existence and nonexistence are, with equal primacy, predicated of a thing simultaneously, there being no proper word to meet the demand, the thing is said inexpressible.
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