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Concept of Omniscience in Jainism : 141
But if it is known through a single supernormal cognition brought about by communion, then there can be no means of cognition to assure for such knowledge because it is not produced either by perception, inference or authority. In second alternative question again remains whether it is actual or possible? If it were actual it would be difficult to conceive a state of knowledge obtained through several cognitions covering even mutually contradictory things. Then it is impossible to apprehend even in hundreds of thousands of years each one of the innumerable things and thus characteristics of all places and at all times. But if such knowledge is only possible, we are again confronted with another problem. If it is possible to know all things and their attributes simultaneously, nothing will remain to be known by the omniscient being. In that case after having the knowledge, he would behave as an unconscious being, since he will have left nothing to cognate. Then another question arises whether by the omniscient, the past and future will be known as present or as they are, i.e. the past as past and future as future. If we accept the first alternative, distinction of time will be lost because the past and future will merge into the immediate present. But if we accept the second alternative, it will imply that the omniscient being cognize the past and the future, which are at present non-existent. Thus in both cases our knowledge will be illusory and wrong2. Thus after examining the different senses of omniscience followings are the pre-requisites to make the concept of omniscience workable:
First, it should be regarded as a true and valid knowledge, for if it is false, it would be only illusory. Secondly, it should not be regarded merely as a potential but as actualized knowledge. Thirdly, it cannot be indirect knowledge like inference or even direct knowledge like sense perception. Fourthly, it cannot be either successive or obtainable through the help of more than one cognition, because in the former case, it can never be complete, while in the latter the same omniscient person will have to contain several cognitions, some of which will even be contradictory. Fifthly, omniscience must mean the knowledge holding good for all the places for all the times. Sixthly, it must mean knowledge of all things with all their attributes.
