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JAINA THEORIES OF REALITY AND KNOWLEDGE
word.' Siddharși supports this idea from another angle by remarking that there are no objects (artha) without names.* Maladhari Hemacandra believes that everything cognisable is also expressible in some way."
The Jaina is, however, cautious in not stretching this belief in the natural power of words to the extent of advocating the identity (tādātmya) of essence between the word and its meaning. Had it not been so he would find himself an ally of Bhartṛhari and the other grammarian philosophers who maintain the doctrine of sabdadvaitavada. According to the Jaina words are only expressive (vācaka) or, as Yasovijaya puts it, suggestive (jnapaka) symbols rather than productive (käraka) entities of meanings. In other words, what is meant by the remark that a meaning resides in a word is nothing more than forcefully stating that the word has the natural power of expressing the meaning which is not produced by, or derived from, it. The meaning is eventually rooted in the nature of things in reality, but is conveyed to us through the natural expressive capacity of words.
The main purpose of introducing here the above brief discussion on the linguistic aspect of syādvada has been to show how far syadvāda can be described as 'mainly verbal', for that matter, a 'verbal' method at all. The discussion
or,
1. pratyartham sabdanivasad iti/ Nyāyāvatāra (of Siddhasena Divākara, with Siddharşi's Vivṛti and Devabhadra's Tippana, ed. P. L. Vaidya, 1928, Bombay), p. 81.
2. nirabhidhänärthābhāvāt / Ibid., p. 80.
3.
4.
kaścit tu gamyatayā sarvo'bhilapyaḥ../ SHM, on ga. 143, VBJ. sabdānāṁ ca arthajñāpakatvam na tu kärakatvam / SKL, p. 250.
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