Lessons of Ahimsa and Anekanta for Contemporary Life

Author(s): Tara Sethia
Publisher: California State Polytechnic University Pomona

Page 74

John Koller, “Why Anekāntavāda is Important?”
omniscient. But a thing becomes the subject matter of a naya, when it is conceived from one particular standpoint.”11 Thus, the nayas serve to categorize the different points of view from which reality might be investigated. Nayavāda also encourages investigators to assume other perspectives, including the important perspective of the other as a persisting, but constantly changing, entity entitled to the same respect for life and happiness as oneself. For example, when one assumes the perspectives of other life-forms, such as animals or plants, it is possible to see and feel their connectedness to us and to feel their suffering when they are injured. Knowing how much like us they are and knowing that they are as dependent on their environment as we are, we have incentive to not injure them and to not destroy them or their environment.
With regard to the number and character of standpoints from which something may be investigated, it is generally agreed that although theoretically there are an unlimited number of them, two opposing standpoints are fundamental. On the one hand, things can be viewed in terms of their substantial being, emphasizing their self-identity, permanence and essential nature. This standpoint regards sameness as fundamental. As an extreme view, it is exemplified by the Advaita teaching that Brahman alone is truly real. On the other hand, things can be viewed in terms of process, emphasizing the changes that they undergo. This standpoint emphasizes difference. In its extreme form it is exemplified by the Buddhist teaching of interdependent co-arising (pratitya samutpada) as the nature of existence, a teaching that insists that everything is selfless (anātman) and impermanent (anitya).
When the differences within each of the two fundamental standpoints of sameness and difference are taken into account we get the standard set of seven standpoints, namely: the ordinary, or undifferentiated; the general; the practical; the clearly manifest; the verbal; the subtle; and the “thus-happened.” The first three,
11 Siddhasena, Nyayavatara, 29. Edited by A.N. Upadhye. Bombay: Jaina Sahitya Vikas Mandal, 1971.
For Private & Poponal Use Only