________________
IV. 1]
MATERIAL NATURE OF KARMAN
225
all the defects of the Sānkhya-Yoga conception of karman ought to apply equally well to the Vedāntin's conception.
The'Nyāya-Vaiseșika admits that the conditions of bondage viz. merit and demerit belong to the soul, but keeps them quite distinct and aloof from it. The soul is held to be immutable and ubiquitous, and merit and demerit, jointly called unseen potency, inhere in it as qualities. But how can the qualities of the soul be responsible for the bondage of the soul? And in the absence of the bondage of the soul, it should be admitted that the soul ever remains free from bondage. It may be argued that as the passions of anger, pride etc. condition the bondage of the soul although they are qualities of it, so there should be no difficulty in admitting that the qualities of the soul can be responsible for the bondage of the soul. But the Jaina's reply to such a contention is: Such changes of the soul as the passions of anger and the like are of the nature of bondage; the changes into anger and the like are indeed the bondage itself of the soul, and not the conditions of the bondage. The passions constitute the bondage. And their conditions must necessarily be distinct and different from them. And the passions being the qualities of the soul, it follows that the conditions of the passions are something distinct and separate from the qualities of the soul. And so the conditions of the passions and. the bondage that they constitute must be sought for in what is material Creation is a veritable intermixture of the spiritual and the material, a beginningless inter-influencing of the two. There is no bondage without the inter-relation of spirit and matter, and there is no interrelation of spirit and matter without the bondage. The philosopher of the Nyāya-Vaiseșika school also admits the fact. But because of his bias for the absolute immutability of the soul and the absolute separateness of the qualities from its substance, he fails to remain consistent with his realistic position by following the verdicts of uncontradicted and well attested experience. How can the mind relate the body with the soul without itself being really related with both? Even the merit and demerit remain without any real relation with the soul. It is impossible to conceive of any real relation without admitting some kind of identity-cum-difference between the relata—a fact which the Nyāya-Vaiseșika is unwilling to accept. According to the Jaina philosopher, the worldly existence is impossible without the admission of the relation of identity-cum-difference between the spiritual and the
1 Cf. nanu cā "tma-gunatvāt karmaņām katham paudgalikatvam ity anye ; te 'py apariksakāḥ ; teşām atma-gunatve tat-pāratantrya-nimittatva-virodhāt sarvadā "tmano bandhānupapatteḥ sadaiva mukti-prasangät--PKM, p. 243.
2 Cf. na ca krodhādibhir vyabhicāraḥ; teşāṁ jīva-pariņāmānām pāratantryasvabhāvatvāt; krodhädi-pariņāmo hi jīvasya pāratantryam na punaḥ pāratantrya-nimittam-PKM, pp. 243-4.
JP-29
Jain Education International
For Private & Personal Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org
