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INTRODUCTION activity carried out by some other entity? He is really non-active Akarta. The Jaina thinkers object to this Sankhya view. They say that if the Puruşa is Akarta or non-active and merely a spectator of an activity carried out by another agency there is no moral justification in maintaining that he is the Bhokta or the enjoyer of the fruits of such an activity. The fruits of activity are either pleasurable or painful, and why should an entity which is not responsible for the activity be destined to enjoy the result of pain or pleasure. Similarly the other schools of thought such as the Mīmāṁsakas and the Vaišeşikas maintain that Jñana or the knowing capacity gets associated with the soul which is by nature intrinsically devoid of this guna or quality. The knowing capacity or Jñana which is a distinct entity from the soul is brought in association with the soul or Jivātma by combination; then the soul becomes the knower. This doctrine also is rejected by the Jaina thinkers as most contradictory, because it would reduce the Ātmā or the soul to a non-thinking entity before it has the good fortune to be combined with Guna or quality of knowledge or Jñana, The knowing capacity or Jñāna is intrinsic manifestation of the spiritual entity Cetana dravya or Jiva. To imagine that the quality of guna can exist separately from the Jíva or the Atma is according to Jaina metaphysics quite impossible and meaningless, because according to this central doctrine of Jainism Guna and Dravya cannot be separated and when so separated each becomes meaningless abstractions incapable of existence in reality. Hence the triple psychic characteristics of knowing, feeling and action are considered inalienable qualities of the Cetana entity, Ātma or Jiva, and they should not be considered to be of independent existence brought together by combination or association. Each quality may vary in intensity or in extensity. But all the three characteristics must be present in any Jiva however high or low it be in the scale of development. The process of Jñana being an intrinsic quality of the Cetana entity or Atma introduces a peculiar attitude in the matter of epistemology according to Jaina thinkers. The basic principle of knowing process of the Jiva or the Ātma, and the variations in the knowing process of a particular Jiva are due to associated conditions. An ordinary living being has access to the environmental objects through sense-perception. Sense perception is through the medium of sense-organs of the body. Since they are parts of the body, physical and physiological the sensory-organs are distinctly material in nature and thus distinct from the nature of Jiva or the Atmā. Sense-perception therefore according to Jaina epistemology is the knowledge which the Ātman acquires of the environment through the intermediary of material sense-organs. Since it is through the intermediary of physiological organs of sense, perceptual knowledge cannot be considered to be immediate access of the soul to the environment objects. Hence senseperception becomes mediate and not immediate. Direct contact of Jiva with the object is what is called pratyaksa by the Jaina thinkers. Since the sense-perception is conditioned by physical sense-organs, it is not immediate.
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