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HERMANN KUHN
SUTRAS
Partial sight (naya) - is a systematic method to gain knowledge of one particular aspect of reality. With the technique of partial sight we examine conditions or features of objects and events from one particular perspective only.
Partial sight focuses our attention on one specific aspect of reality like looking at it through a magnifying glass.
The deeper and the more precise we penetrate a partial aspect, the deeper and clearer will be our comprehension of the entire level of reality of which this aspect is a part. Profound insight into one single experience may thus open our understanding for an entire level of reality - as the part often reveals the whole behind it.55
The sutra introduces a systematic method for exploring partial areas of our reality. It describes seven consecutive and interdependent steps that lead us ever closer to the examined object. The last step is the full integration of the (new) insight into our consciousness. Like in Total Perception - pramana - the insight then becomes part of the basis of integrated knowledge we rely on for steering our life.
The method of partial sight is exquisitely suited for becoming aware of vague experiences. It works even faster when we use it in dialogue with similarly interested people. It is much easier to verbalize our insights - step 5 - if we have a partner to talk to.
Since reality is a complex object, there of course exists an infinite number of partial views (nayas) from which this object (reality) can be perceived. The Tattvarthasutra states that every perspective - as global as it might appear - always only represents a partial truth. The
55 Though the expansion of understanding from part to the whole hap
pens on intuitive levels beyond intellectual patterns like logic or deduction, it is not less precise and systematic. We experience insights of this kind as sudden dynamic understanding, where our mind and feelings encounter an intuitive rearrangement of meaning. All new ideas, concepts, inventions etc. this world ever produced originated in this kind of dynamic insight.
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