Source Book in Jaina Philosophy

Author(s): Devendramuni
Publisher: Tarak Guru Jain Granthalay

Page 78

A SOURCE-BOOK IN JAINA PHILOSOPHY
57 practical and conventional measurements of time. Similarly, the conventional and practical distincition and division in Akāśa is considered as measurable space called “Dik' (direction) and it is not an independent substance.
The present synthesises the past and the future. The past and the future have their importance on account of the present. Whenever we accept the existence of a thing. we have to admit that it existed in the past and will continue to exist in future. It is not possible to say that the object would exist in original state for all time. It undergoes modifications ; still modifications do not affect the real and substantial nature of the object. In the Tattvārthasūtra, dravya (substance) has been defined as that which has undergone modifications, which undergoes and which will continue to do so in future also.1 The real nature of the object remains unchanged in and through all modifications. If it were not so, the substantial nature of the object would not remain and the past and the future changes would not have relation wbatever. The object does express the identity in mcdifications. The substance does imply the reality, Ācārya Umāsvāti says that dravya expresses the attributes of origination, permanence and destruction. He also says that substance is that which has modifications. He has in this connection, used the word paryāya (modification) in the place of utpada (origination) and vyaya (destruction) and the dhrauvya in place of guna. Utpada (origination) and vyaya (destruction) imply the concept of change. Every object has two aspects i identity and difference, permanence and change. Similarly, it exhibits the qualities of similarity and dis-similarity. The core is the permanent nature of the object and that which changes and undergoes modification. We find that the qualities are expressed in modifications. In the substantiality of the object, there is permanence, and in modifications we get change. Permanence and change, therefore, are equally real. The origination and destruction express modifications of the substances, but the substance remains permanent, it is not destroyed. For purposes of explaining this, Umāsvāti calls it “Tadbhāvāvyaya'.3 This is the characteristic of permanence. Ācārya Kundkunda defines dravya (substance) as that 1 Tattvärthasūtra, 5, 29. 2 Tattvärthasūtra, 5, 37. 3 Tattvārthasūtra, 5, 30.