Sambodhi 1990 Vol 17

Author(s): H C Bhayani
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 66

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with the content of the cognition that prompts his behaviour. To be more precise, one behaves consistently with the object of the true cognition that prompts his consistent behaviour and one belaves inconsistently with the object of the false cognition that prompts his inconsistent behaviour. This object of cognition is the universe around him.
The next question that arises is whether this object of cognition i.e. the universe with which we behave has any ontological reality. Opinions of the philosophers are clivided on this issue.
While the philosophers belonging to the realistic schools like the NyāyaVaiseșika and Mimämsä hold that the world with which we behave is real, the idealists like the Buddhists and the Advaitins hold that it is mental projection and so the universe has no ontological reality.
This raises the next question : what is Reality ? In other words, liow to decide whether x is real or unreal. The logicians attempted definitions of rcality and falsity in terms of true and false cognitions respectively. If a cognition is true, its content is true and if it is false, the content is also false. Thus, an object of a congition which is not contradicted by any subsequent cognition is said to be real, whereas an object of a cognition that is contradicted by a subsequent cognition is said to be false. (abūdhitajižānā-vişayah satyaḥ and bädhita-jiānavişayah asatyaḥ).
For the Realists was the position stated above, but for the Idealists though the position about unreal remained the same, they suggested degrees of Realities for the sake of explaining human behaviour. For the Idealists like the Buddhists, however, sünyată may alone be the reality. For the Vedäntins, the ultimate reality is the Brabman, and really speaking there is no other reality in true sense of the term. But since human beings are behaving consistently with this world they had to posit a Reality called vyūvahärika-reality. Since human beings also behave inconsistently with the object of a false cognition they had to postulate a third type of reality called prātibhäșika reality. Thus, for the Advaitin, there are three types of reality (1) päramärthika, (2) vyāvahärika and (3) prätibhäşika. The silver with which one makes or naments is a vyāvahārika-reality, the silver seen in the glittering conch-shell is a prātibhāsika-reality and the Brahman is the päramärthika-reality. The silver seen in the conch-shell has existence (sattā) only for the time till one discovers that it is not silver but only a conch-shell. This satta is called the prälibhäsika-satta.
The relationship among these realities is quite interesting. If looked closely, one can see that the existence of the silver, seen in a conch-shell, has the duration of the cognition of the silver till it is known that it is not