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LXXVIII
ÞRAVACANASĀRA.
criticised the doctrine of omniscience; so the Pūrvämīmāmsă view is worthy of note; and it will have to be studied in the context of some of the special tenets of that school. With the Pūrvamīmāmsā Vedic injunctions are of the highest authority; the performance of the sacrifice is the highest duty which when performed gives rise to some unprecedented cosmic potency (apūrva), a potential after state of acts', which brings about all the fruits for the performer of the sacrifice. These tenets cannot allow any one to claim omniscience for the simple reason that if any one were to be omniscient outside the Vedic fold, his words would be looked upon as infallible and the Vedic authority woul be questioned. Kumārila says that the human being might see only the general aspect of things, and hence it is not possible to believe that a man can see all things in all places and of all times. The omniscient will have to be a dirty being, because, being necessitated by the function of seeing, he will have to come into contact with so many dirty things. There is a limit to visionary or knowing ability, and it cannot be stretched beyond that; so none can be able to see things which are supersensuous. None of the five proofs can justify any one's omniscience. The so called omniscients do not agree among themselves; their words are against Vedas whose authority is unquestionable; and no omniscient is ever come across by anybody: so omniscience is an impossibility. The, all-knowledge attributed to Brahman means only self-knowledge. This attack of Kumärila has twofold handicaps: first, his hands are tied down by the above tenets of his school, and secondly, he has not distinguished sense-perception from omniscience; he attacks omniscience as if it is sense-perception intensified and magnified. Kundakunda has plainly told us that senses have no part to play in omniscience; it is the spirit, being a knower by nature and essentia constituted of knowledge, that comes face to face with the complex reality, and comprehends it immediately and simultaneously in its entirety with no effort on his part and with no effect on his spiritual constitution.
OMNISCIENCE ELSEWHERE AND OMNISCIENT BLISS.--The creating Īs'vara of the Nyaya school is omniscient, because the doer or kartā must know his actions with their causes, and the universe being an object of knowledge must be known by somebody. Partial counterparts of and similarities with this notion might be detected in the Alaukika-pratyaksa of the Nyāya school and in the Samādhi-aprajñāta meditation and some meditational achievements of the Yoga school. There is another aspect of omniscienee emphasized by Kundakunda that it is a spiritual state of eternal bliss. It is essentially the spiritual happiness; the senses have no scope there, for their happiness or pleasure is not independent as it is contingent on the conjunction of two entities. If it is, once realised there is no end to that. It is attainable only after the destruction of various hindering karmas. In this state knowledge and bliss are identical, because both of them are identical with the self. This condition is
possible for a Tīrthakara and a Siddha. It is to be aspired after by religious - aspirants. This state can be happily compared with, so far as its reference to
1 S'Ickarúrtiki verses 111 etc..
