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Men or Gods
207 for the search for a divine being. In ancient Greece, Xenophanes was against the polytheism of his time. Socrates had to drink hemlock as he was charged of denying the national gods. He distinguished between many gods and the one God who is the creator of the universe.
2. The Jaina Arguments against God: But the Jainas were against gods in general and even the God as creator. They presented several arguments against the theistic conception of God. They deny the existence of a Creator God and refute the theistic arguments of the Naiyāyikas". The Naiyāyika argument that the world is of the nature of an effect created by an intelligent agent who is God (isvara) cannot be accepted because :
i) It is difficult to understand the nature of the world as an effect :
a) if effect is to mean that which is made of parts (sāva
yava) then even space is to be regarded as effect;
b) if it means coherence of a cause of a thing which was
previously nonexistent, in that case one cannot speak of the world as effect as atoms are eternal;
c) if it means that which is liable to change, then God
would also be liable to change; and he would need a creator to create him and another and so on ad infinitum. This leads to infinite regress.
ii) Even supposing that the world as a whole is an effect and needs a cause, the cause need not be an intelligent one as God because :
a) if he is intelligent as the human being is, then he
would be full of imperfections, as human intelligence is not perfect;
3. Gunaratna, Tarka-rahasya-dipika.
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