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PRABUDDH JEEVAN
JANUARY 2014
THE GLORIOUS DARŠANAS
BY: ATISUKHSHANKAR TRIVEDI
CHAPTER 2: NĀSTIKA DARSAN
Syādvāda: The different points of view from which Materialism or the Lokāyata View:Lokāyata=di-rected
things may be viewed are called Nayas in Jain Phito the world Sense. It is the view which rests on Sense
losophy; they talk of 7 points of view and so of
Saptabhanginaya (7 alternative view-points). This is perception as the only source of knowledge. The doctrine is connected with the name of Chārvāka, and was
their view of the Relativity of Being. first collected in the Sūtras of Brihaspati which have
In the same way there is also the Ralativity of Predi
cation. This view of theirs is known as their Syädvāda, perished. Accoridng to it there is no soul. The soul is identified differently with the gross body, the sense, the
i.e., Maybe-ism; May be, it is; may be, it is not; may be, breath and the organ of thought. Matter alone is real,
it is and is not; may be it is not predicable; may be, it is for perception can cognise nothing else, There is noth
and yet not predicable; may be, it is not, and yet not ing like inference. Heaven and Hell are delusions. Only
predicable; may be it is and is not, and yet predicable.
The brief upshot of all this is : affirmation can never be this world exists. In this world pleasure and pain are central facts. 'Eat,
absolute.* drink and be marry' should be the rule of life.
In their theory of knowledge the Jains recognise two The Vedas are to be disregarded. The Vedic rites
kinds of knowledge-Perceptual and Non-Perceptual,
the former giving direct, the latter indirect, and therewere only invented as a means of livelihood. If a beast
fore includes Inference, Imagination, Memory. They do slain in a sacrifice goes to heaven, why does not the sacrificer slay his own father and send him to heaven?
not accept Testimony i.e. the Vedas. When the body is reduced to ashes, nothing remains
Metaphysically, they accept two chief categories: of it; how can it ever return?
Jiva (souls) and Ajiva (not-souls). The Jains believe Jainism : Jainism is older than Buddhism. The first
that even the smallest particles are possessed of souls; Tirthankara was Rishabha and the 24th was
that the universe is full of minute beings, groups of infiVardhamana Mahāvira who flourished from 599 B.C. to
nite souls, the nigodas, which are like the Monads of
the Leibnitzian Philosophy or like the life element of 527 B.C. There are two Sects of Jainism, the
Bergson. The Jivas have gradations is them as there Svetāmbaras and the Digambaras, the latter having more rigorous ascetic rules than the former. Their sa- * Athing may be considered in its 464 (own form), cred books consist of 14 Parvas and 11 Angas, almost 504 (own matter), CT (own place), colt (own time), all written between the 6th and 12th century A.D. or not in its form, but other form (964), 54, &
The Chhāndogya Upanişad saw that the Permanent clc, Now a jug is; it is clay, but it is not, as not, gold; alone was Real. As against this Buddhism held that is = is here, but is not = is not there. So may be it is, there is no Unchanging Substance, only the passing may be it is not. If we emphasise one view, the other is qualities exist.
not predicable; again, if we emphasise both predicates, Jainism offers a reconciliation of Vedāntism and Bud- here and there, of the jug, the jug is indescribable. All dhism, against the Absolutism of the Upanişads and judgements are according to Jainism double-edged; the Pluralism of Buddhism. It offers Relative Pluralism every affirmation has a negation; if we say that the jug (Anekāntavāda). The Jaina view was that nothing could is clay, we imply that it is not gold or stone and so on. absolutely exist (Na-Ekānta): affirmations are true only This means that things have a complex nature, an idenrelatively. Thus a gold jug is substance as a collection tity in difference. A pot (1) is 3 (non-permanent: it of gold atoms, but is not so in the sense of jug-space breaks, (2) is not so as clay; (3) is and is not fire from (ākāśa). It is and is not a substance. It is atomic as different points or view; (4) is indescribable, if without made up of earth-atoms and not of water-atoms, and refering to points of view you say it is and is not fire, so on. Affirmation is thus true only in a limited or rela- (5) is (FR) and is indescribable; (6) is not and is intive sense.
describable, and (7) is and is not indescribable.
