New Dimensions in Jaina Logic

Author(s): Mahaprajna Acharya, Nathmal Tatia
Publisher: Today and Tommorrow Printers and Publishers

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32 New Dimensions in Jaina Logic
sake of self-existence and self-preservation, and due to the pressure of the religious, social and political circumstances there arose a vital necessity for the Jainas to defend their own doctrines through argument and logic by participating in assemblies of logicians and philosophers. The Jaina philosophers, at such times, started taking interest in self-defence against the doctrines of the opposite camps. But their method of refutation was free from untoward vituperation. Their refutations were synthesis-oriented in the interest of the cause of non-violence and for strengthening the search for truth. Such thought-activity of the Jainas is reflected in the following statement of Haribhandra Sūri-"How can the authors of spiritual discourses, who are great souls, be the propounders of incompatible doctrine perfectly detached as they are from worldly things and fully engaged in the welfare of all living beings?” The question inevitably arises 'Why then are there such differences among the philosophies?” Haribhadra's answer to this is-"You should find out the intentions of those philosophers. To point out the contradictions without knowing the implications is not an attempt at knowing the truth.” “The poor philosophers quarrel among themselves”, says Siddhasena Divakara, “on account of diversities of their terminology and intention, though the instruments of cognition employed by them for the ascertainment of truth enjoy universal validity.":27
While Siddhasena Divakara madę laudable efforts for synthesizing the different philosophies of his times, Samantabhadra commanded an uncommon power of formulating Jaina position in a language which evinces his deep understanding of all systems of Indian philosophy and their refutation from the Jaina standpoint. Samantabhadra was in fact a first-rate Jaina philosopher, who gave a firm footing to Jaina ontology, which remained unsurpassed in centuries that followed. Siddhasena Divākara can be considered as a pioneer philosopher who took a synthetic view of philosophies while formulating the doctrine of anekānta as a philosophy of philosophies. His method of treatment of Samkhya, Buddhist and Vaisesika systems exhibits his wonderful ingenuity and critical acumen for their synthesis. He has characterised the Samkhya system as an approach to reality from the standpoint of substance, which has resulted in the postulation of 'purusa' as an unchanging eternal real, The Buddhists, on the other hand, look at the real from the modal standpoint, and as such they, particularly the Hinayanists, propounded the philosophy of universal flux (kşanikavāda). Of these two, viz, the Samkhya and the Buddhist, one