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104 :: Structure and Functions of Soul in Jainism
not-self, then conation is reduced to a superfluous entity. He tries to solve the problem by stating that knowledge prehends things other than the self, conation prehends things identical with the self, and, therefore, the two cannot be the same. From the above contention it is clear that the writer does not like to deviate from the general view that conation and knowledge are two distinct faculties of the soul. He establishes this distinction on the ground of a distinction in the subject matter; and thereby he must mean that the self cannot be prehended by knowledge and the not-self, by conation. This view distinguishes conation from knowledge on subjective grounds, while so far they were distinguished on objective ones. In the commentary on the Dravyasangraha Brahmadeva makes the pupil say: "If conation prehends the self and knowledge, the not-self, then the fault that knowledge does not know the self comes in."2
He solves the difficulty as against the Nyāya view by referring to the postulation of two distinct attributes of conation and knowledge in Jaina philosophy. He also mentions that from the non-distinctive view-point the same consciousness, when it prehends the self, is said to be conation and, when prehending the not-self, is said to be knowledge. This implies that, when the distinctive point of view is adopted, conation and knowledge must come out to be two distinct constitutive attributes; and, when the nondistinctive view is meant, consciousness absorbs not only conation and knowledge but all the special attributes of the soul. The identity of consciousness has been shown to be based on the generality of the special attributes of the soul. Conation and knowledge, being two different attributes of the soul, must determine two distinct flows of their modes. Neither conation nor knowledge can be said to be absent in a soul, whether liberated or mundane, even for a moment. Every moment of the soul's existence must evince modes of conation and knowledge simultaneously. The conclusion is
1. Ibid., p. 383 2. Brahmadeva: Dravyasangraha-vrtti, p. 82
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