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Jaina Philosophy and Religion
features from others through intellectual analysis and says that the horse is red, tall, or belongs to a particular breed. At that time though the horse is revealed to the speaker in his intellect as also to the hearer in his cognition, it is secondary. It is only those features which are stated after having separated or abstracted them from other features, that are primary. This is the reason why the horse, while becoming the object of knowledge, becomes its object as qualified by a certain aspect or character only. This is the way how a thing becomes the object of naya.
When knowledge gained with or without the assistance of sense-organs reveals a thing as it is, it is called pramāna. And the thought-activity touching, one by one, the different aspects of a thing in order to convey through words the very thing revealed to him through pramāna is called naya. In other words, knowledge that is being expressed in words is naya, and knowledge that precedes it is pramāņa.
Naya is only a part of pramāņa. Different currents of nayas spring forth from pramāņa.
As already stated, comprehensive or all-sided knowledge (pramāna) grasps a thing in its entirety, while one-sided or partial knowledge (naya) grasps primarily only one of the many characters or aspects of a thing. One person sees or understands a thing in one form and another person sees or understands it in another form. So about one and the same thing different persons form different opinions. X does not understand the way in which Y understands a thing, and vice versa. But if they know each other's different understandings, rather standpoints or ways of understanding, their incomplete understanding will become complete. And they will try to understand each other's standpoints provided they are sincere truth-seekers. If one who knows the utility of only one of the two, viz., knowledge and practice, or understands only one of the two apparently opposite doctrines, viz., dualism and monism, directs his thoughtactivity to know and understand the other point or standpoint, he will surely accept it too.
Just as pramāna is pure knowledge, so also naya is pure knowledge. The only difference that obtains between the two is that the former grasps the entire thing, while the latter grasps only one of its many aspects or characters. Inspite of this difference, both are pure, rather valid, knowledge. Pure knowledge of the form of pramāņa is utilised in worldly dealings or communication through the instrumentality of naya, because when it is expressed in words before others, it being put under certain special
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