Reals on the Jaina Metaphysics

Author(s): Harisatya Bhattacharya
Publisher: Shatnidas Khetsy Charitable Trust Mumbai

Page 54

The Problem of Reals
39 śreņi or series of space-points) being marked by the rise of the Sun and so on. The apprehension of Space is essential to our apprehension of direction, 'this is to the East of it etc. It is thus reasonable to explain our apprehension of directions by a reference to Ākāśa or Space without admitting the reality of a separate Real called Dik.
Manas or the Mind is another non-psychical Real admitted by the Vaišeşika's. Observation shows that our sensations come in, one after another and not all simultaneously. It is the Manas as a Real which prevents the sensations from rising simultaneously. The Jainas look upon Manas as the internal sense and refuse to regard it as an independent Real. According to them, it is either Dravya-manas or Bhāva-manas and the former is constituted of very fine and subtle matter called Manovargaņā. As such it is purely material in essence.
The JAINA AND THE NON-JAINA ACCOUNTS OF REALS
Now, to sum up, the problem of Reals is raised in the systems of Indian philosophy and the Jaina answer to it has been indicated above, alongside those offered by the other systems. Reals are denied by the Buddhistic Sūnya-vāda. The Jainas would join with a section of the Sābdikas who refute this nihilistic line of thought, but they would repudiate the Sābdika doctrine of the Sabdādvaita and point out that the Real is neither one nor does it consist in Noumenal Sound. The Jainas would agree with the Vedāntins that the conscious principle is a Real but would differ from them by urging that it is not the one and the only fundamental Real in the world, but that there are non-psychical Reals as well. The Jaina's are one with the Çārvāka materialists in maintaining that Matter is a Real, but they would reject their theory of the unsubstantiality of the psychical principle. The Jaina philosphers join the Sāṁkhya thinkers in holding that the conscious souls are Real independent of each other and many in number and that besides these conscious Reals, there is the unconscious Reality; but they would differ from them by pointing out that the unconscious