Sambodhi 2005 Vol 28

Author(s): Jitendra B Shah, K M Patel
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 43

Vol. XXVIII, 2005
AN OUTLINE OF JAINA EPISTEMOLOGY
Paroksa (indirect knowledge) is acquired by the soul without an intervention of external agencies. It includes mati and śruta, for these are acquired by the soul through the medium of the senses and the mind. Knowledge attained by yoga in three stages namely, avadhi'5, manahparyāya 6 and kevala"), is a type of pratyaksa, direct knowledge because it is acquired by the soul not through the medium of the senses.
Umāsvati contends that inference, comparison, verbal testimony, presumption, probability and non-existence etc., cannot be separate means of valid knowledge. He includes them under paroksa. He is of the view that the majority of them are the result of the contact of the senses with the objects. Some of them cannot be the means of valid knowledge at all. It is interesting to note that earlier philosophers accept all sense perceptions like visual perception etc., under indirect apprehensions inasmuch as the soul acquires them through the medium of the senses. The words paroksa and pratyaksa are thus used by the Jaina philosophers in the senses quite opposite to those which they bear in Hindu logic and in the latter Jaina logic. Aksa, according to Jains, is Atmā or soul!8.
Cognition, according to the Jaina epistemology, is itself a pramāna. It is self-luminous; it apprehends itself directly, and also its object". The Jainas thus accept the svatahprāmānyavāda theory unlike the Hindu logicians. It is understood from this that the cognition is not accepted as a quality or as a special quality of the soul. On the other hand it constitutes the very nature of soul. Further, it is not a product and not understood as an instance, very temporal in character. 3. The Nature of Valid Knowledge
I The Jainas agree with the Nyāya-Vaiśesikas in their theory of valid knowledge. Pramā (valid knowledge) is the determinate cognition of itself and its object, and invalid knowledge is the indeterminate cognition of an object in something in which it is not present, that is, the indeterminate cognition of an object is different from what it really is. Valid knowledge is capable of practical efficiency in the form of the selection of good things and the avoidance of evil things. The validity of cognition consists in its agreement with the object cognized, and the invalidity consists in its disagreement with the object cognized. Both the validity and invalidity of cognition arise from extraneous circumstances, viz. the special virtues and the defects in their causes of origination. But they are self