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Davya, Guņa and Paryāya in Jaina Thought : 165
takes on a particular significance in the context of jiva-dravya, which is the only sentient principle in Jaina ontology. It was asked above whether there is an implicit distinction between the svabhāva of a dravya and its guņa and paryāya. Two gathās need to be quoted here in order to give the context in which Kundakunda uses the term svabhāva, before proceeding with the discussion in the context of jīva-dravya :
jāyate naiva na naśyati kşaņa-bhangasamudbhave jane kaścit / yo hi bhavaḥ sa vilayaḥ sambhavavilayāviti tau nānā //
'In this world, in which modifications originate and pass away at every moment, nothing is absolutely produced or destroyed; what is production of one modification is the destruction of another, and thus origination and destruction are different”.
tasmāttu nāsti kaścit svabhāva-samavasthita iti samsāre / samsāraḥ punaḥ kriyā sasārato dravyasya //
"In this world, therefore, there is nothing as such absolutely established in its nature; after all mundane existence is (only) an activity of the soul-substance which is moving (in four grades of existence)” (Prs sīkā II, 27-28).
The crucial statement here is that in the world “there is nothing as such which is absolutely established in its nature". In the context of the point under discussion it means that the jīva can never be as itself because if it is in the world it is always tainted by karman. Kundakunda's description of the jīva is :
arasam arūpam agandham avyaktam cetanā-aguņamaśabdam / jānihy-alinga-grahaņar jāvam anirdista-samsthānam //
“Know that the (pure) soul is without (the qualities of ) taste, colour, smell, touch and sound; it is sentient; it is beyond inferential mark; and it has no definite shape" (PrS II, 80). This obviously refers to the svabhāva of jīva although the gāthā does not explicitly state it. The distinction then between the svabhāva of a dravya and its guna and paryāya seems to be that the svabhäva of a dravya
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