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Preliminary Considerations
reflective nature of philosophy is given the importance it deserves, it is held by all the traditions of Indian philosophy that the culmination of the interrogative mode is to be found in the transforming influence it has on human life.
Philosophy, according to this line of thinking, is not a logical game merely. Though quenching the thirst of intellectual curiosity is achieved through philosophy, that is not the ultimate end envisaged. It is a means and, unless its findings are interiorised and made to become part and parcel of one's being, the philosophic pursuit itself is to be deemed incomplete and hence futile.
The close-knit relationship between rational inquiry and the experience that ought to result from it (if thought does not remain mere thought but lights up and transforms human life) as Indian thought would point out, is responsible for philosophy being considered to have a practical goal. Rather than being a mere world-view, philosophy offers a view of life which results in a way of life being adopted. Thus it is that an inquiry into the nature of Reality, outer and inner - is considered a means to achieving an ultimate end, spiritual freedom. And this is variously referred to as mokṣa, mukti, nirvāṇa, etc.
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The ultimate ideal referred to here is not considered a mental construct merely but as comprehensible only when it is realised in one's own experience. While visualising what that experience might be is worthwhile, neither verbally describing it nor rationally analysing its structure, is totally helpful. For, the realm of speculation and the thoughtworld of logic are characterised utmost with mediate knowledge and high probability whereas the realm of intuitive experience is characterised both by immediacy and certainty. As S. Radhakrishnan remarks, the ultimate experience "is sovereign in its own right and carries its own credentials. It is self-established (svatassiddha), self-evidencing (svasamvedya) and self-luminous (svayamprakāśa).”17
The nature of Reality revealed in intuition is held to be total and complete. Intellection alone cannot be relied upon here. For, analysis which is the function of the intellect, is a necessary condition, it is not a sufficient condition for getting an insight into the Totality. While perception and intellection are capable of pointing the way to Reality it is intuition 18 which is said to help the individual 'reach' it.
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