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Jainism
the stature of Sankarācārya to detect faults and thereby to repudiate the well-deserved claims of the Theory of Manifold Aspects instead of acknowledging the obvious good points in it being driven by the hardened narrow sectarian outlook, attitude and approach. Sankarācārya's refutation that Anekānta lands us in doubt will be thought valid only if and when the Jainas are wavering about both conclusions regarding any particular thing and are unable to offer any definite solution. On the contrary, the Jainas had been able to establish the truth of any one of the two conclusions on the basis of relative consideration, leaving no scope to uncertainty. There is no room for suspicion and uncertainty if the advocate of the theory of Manifold Aspects finds and has arguments for both the aspects, namely, the aspect of motherhood and the aspect of wifehood existing simultaneously in a woman standing in front of him. There is no contradiction also because the grounds are different. There will be contradiction, indeed, if motherhood and wifehood are believed to be existing from one and the same point of view. But the Jainas do not believe like this. When a thing is believed as one, whole and eternal it is because of the Dravyārthika Naya and when it is believed to be consisting of parts and ever-changing, it is due to the Paryayārthika Naya. When this is so, where is the contradiction ?
Synthetic approach in the Vedas.
The concept of the manifold aspects is as old as Rgveda. When the Vedas sta ted stating that there are many gods, discussions began to arise whether Indra was superior to Varuna of vice-versa. The devotees began to argue in favour of their choice and this is natural also. But the controversy ended when it was tested by Anekānta. Sage Dirghatamā said "gari erg fast
Fat asfa" (Rgveda, 1, 164, 46) which means there is but one truth and one only, but the learned give it different names. Thus, all the gods were represented by one. The seeming antagonism existing between Varuna and Indra and also between other gods was thus removed and all were stream-lined into one and the controversy was thus explained away. In doing this, the sage did not see in the Theory of Manifold Aspects the traces of the Theory of Nescience or Doubt and also did not find contradiction. Then the question arises as to why did Śankarācārya, who was a philosopher-king sce the defects in the Jainas' Theory of Manifold Aspects? The reply to this is found in Sankarācārya's sectarian view-point.
This very Śari karācārya who saw so many faults as doubt, ignorance, and contradiction in the Jaina Theory of Manifold Aspects (Anekanta) forgot the same when he wrote commentary on the Upanişads. In it, he has
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