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A SOURCE-BOOK IN JAINA PHILOSOPHY
AVAYA
The third factor in matijñāna is avaya. From the stage of associated integration (īhā) we come to the stage of interpretation. The sensations of interpreted and the meaning is assigned to the organisation of sensation. Tha is integration of the sensations, avāya interpretes and determines the meaning of the sensation.1 In avaya there is a definite determination about the meaning of the perception. In this we come to the judgement about the nature of the object. This is therefore called perceptual judgement, still it is non-verbal. Avaśyakaniryukti defines avaya as determinate cognition. In the Sarvārthasiddhi, we get the description of avaya as cognition of the true notion of the object through cognition of particular characteristics. Umāsvāti says that upagma, upanoda, apavyādha, apeta, apaviddha, apanuta and apagata are synonyms of avaya. They mean the determinate cognition. Nandīsūtra gives āvartanatā, pratyāvartanatā, buddhi, vijñāna as synonyms. Tattvārtha bhāṣya describes avāya as the stage of ascertainment of right and exclusion of wrong. For example, on hearing sound, a person determines that the sound must be of a counch and not of a horn, because it is sweet and not hard. This type of ascertainment of the existing specific features of the object is called avāya and it involves perceptual judgement.
Some Jaina logicians say that avāya has only a negative function. In this stage of experience there is only the exclusion of non-existing qualities. They ascribe the cognition of the existing quality to a later stage of experience called dhāraṇā. But Jinabhadra says that the view is not correct. Because avaya does not merely perform the negative function of excluding non-existing qualities. But it also determines the existing characteristics. Umāsvāti agrees with this view. Pūjapāda says that avaya cognises specific features of the objects cognised in the
1 Pramāṇamīmāṁsā, 1, 1, 28.
2 Viseşāvasyaka bhāṣya, 1, 79.
3 Sarvārthasiddhi, 1, 15.
4 Tattvärthasutra bhāṣya, 1, 15.
5 Nandisutra, 53.
6 Tattvärthasūtra bhāṣya, 1, 15.
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