Practical Path

Author(s): Champat Rai Jain
Publisher: ZZZ Unknown

Page 24

THE METHOD OF PHILOSOPHY.
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conventions of men designed to expedite their intercourse with their fellow beings, and must get hold of the actual truth by combining the results of investigation made from different points of view. A thorough insight into the philosophy of stand-points is also necessary to estimate the true value of the statements of our predecessors in the field of metaphysical research. Mankind would find that almost all the confusion of thought, and we might also say the animosity existing between the followers of different religions, would cease to exist as soon as they would test the scriptural text which most of us blindly adhere to with the aid of the touch-stone of naya-váda (the philosophy of stand-points). If they would only insert the word 'somehow' before any scriptural or prophetic statement, they would find their minds becoming trained in the right direction to enquire into the stand-point of the prophet who made any particular statement. The word ' somehow' (Syât in Sanskrit) would show that the statement was made from a particular point of view, and would at once direct the mind to find out what that stand-point is. It would also enable us to reconcile many a seemingly contradictory statement in the scriptures of the same creed as well as in those of different faiths ; for it does often happen that a statement which is wrong from one particular point of view is not so from another, e.g., one observer might say that a bowl full of water contains no air, while another might describe it as containing nothing else but air, both being right from their respective stand-points, since water is only gaseous matter in its essence though manifested in the form of a liquid