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of revelation for instance is not to be invoked to show that heat destroys cold, which is a matter of common experience.1 Now it is clear that revelation should speak to us in terms of our experience, for otherwise it will be unintelligible and will therefore fail of its purpose. Even the scripture cannot teach the unknown through the unknown, so that the theme of revelation cannot be wholly out of relation to human experience. When we take the condition of novelty along with this fact that the terms in which transcendental truth is communicated must necessarily be known to us, we see that what is revealed, so far at least as philosophic truth is concerned, cannot be altogether new, but can only be a new way of construing our experience. (ii.) The next condition is that what is revealed should not be contradicted (abadhita) by any of the other pramāņas.3 Nor should one part of it be in conflict with another. This means that the content of revelation must be internally coherent and that, though it may be above reason, it cannot be against it. The very fact that conditions are laid down for determining the validity of revelation makes it evident that it cannot be opposed to reason. (iii.) It is not only thus negatively that revelation is related to reason. The relation is also positive in that we find a third condition laid down, viz. that reason should foreshadow what revelation teaches. That is, revealed truth must appear probable. If this condition again is not to clash with the first one of novelty, we must take it as meaning only a rough forecast of the truth under consideration by means of analogies drawn from the empirical sphere. They are not proofs of revealed truth; yet they are not useless, since they serve to remove any 'antecedent improbability' that may be felt to exist about the truth in
The statement-agniḥ himasya bheṣajam-actually occurs in the Veda, but it is explained as an anuvada or 'echoing' what is known already. 2 See Sabara on Jaimini-sutra, I. iii. 30. 3 Cf. the word avyatireka ('not negatived') occurring in Jaiminisutra, I. i. 5.
+ Cf. Anandajñāna's gloss on Samkara's com. on Br. Up. p. 8; Sambhāvanā-mātrena lingopanyāsaḥ. Na hi niścāyakatvena tadupanyasyate.
