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172
PROBLEM OF AVIDYA
[CH.
is absurd. Secondly, the identification of the Absolute with the contingent effect would make the former a contingent fact, a position which is denied by the Vedāntist. It may be asserted that the plurality of phenomena derives its genesis from something different from the Absolute. But this would be tantamount to the assertion of dualism, as a cause numerically different from the Absolute is posited. The Vedāntist may contend that this cause of the phenomenal world is nothing but an unreal māyā and the assertion of such an unreal fact does not militate against real monism. But we cannot accept the defence, because an unreal cause is a contradiction in terms. In fact causal efficiency is the criterion of reality. It may be contended that the effect is also unreal appearance and so there is no logical repugnance in the postulation of an unreal cause. But the question may be seriously posed 'Why should the felt plurality be dismissed as unreal? An unreal fiction is not amenable to experience. It is not found that fone fiction produces another fiction on the basis of which we could imagine that the appearance of plurality is produced from unreal māyā. It is not observed that a square circle produces a square triangle.'1 The Vedāntist may rejoin 'Well, what about feats of magic? The magic produces a phantasmagoria which nobody accepts as truth on sober reflection. Yet the appearance deceives the spectator so long as it lasts.' But the show of magic, whether it be fire or smoke or anything else, is not entirely unreal. At any rate the experience of it is real. If the experience itself were unreal there would be nothing to determine that there was a magical show at all. Nor can it be maintained that the show is unreal quâ an existent fact, because even on the admission of the Vedāntist there is no lapse of existence even in false experience.2 There must be an objective basis even for what is called an unreal appearance. This basis is admitted to be true even by the Vedāntist himself. This shows that however one may dispute the objectivity of the predicative part of the false judgment, the subject at any rate has got to be admitted as real. We cannot even conceive that an unreal fiction can appear as a content of experience. We have never experienced even in dream a square circle.
As regards erroneous perception, neither the subject nor the predicate is absolutely unreal like a square circle. The Vedāntist may contend that he does not affirm that the objective world of plurality is an unreal fiction. But it is not real as it is found to be contradicted by a subsequent experience. But the question is 'Does not the denial of unreality involve the admission of reality?' A thing may be either
1 Cf.... katham akiñcidrūpasya kāraṇatvam? kāryasyā 'py akiñcidrūpatvăd adosa iti cet kim idānim kharavişāņād aśva-vişāņasya janmā 'sti-Ibid.
2. Nā 'pi bahiḥsaddravyādi-rūpayor māya-svabhāvatva vyabhicăritvābhävāt-Ibid., p. 158.
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