Systems of Indian Philosophy

Author(s): Virchand R Gandhi
Publisher: Mahavir Jain Vidyalay

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THE SYSTEMS OF INDIAN PHILOSOPHY
Jainism which is the last lecture in the present seriesGandhi enumerates what he considers to be the four questions basic to all philosophical investigation; they are :
(i) What is the nature of the universe ? (ii) What is the nature of God ? (iii) What is the nature and what the destiny of soul ? (iv) What are the laws of the soul's life?
[The questions (iii) and (iv) are closely related, the former enquiring about the general nature of a soul, its bondage and its liberation, the latter enquiring about the functioning of the "law of Karma"]. And his exposition of Jainism is in the form of a discussion of the Jaina answer to these four questions. In the case of the rest of the systems there is no ordered treatment of these questions, but there too Gandhi is always taking up one or another from among these very questions (which is but to be expected in view of Gandhi's understanding of what constitutes a philosophical investigation being what it is). And it should not be difficult for an intelligent reader to make out for himself how this or that system differs from Jainism on this or that question. But Gandhi, almost totally unmindful of this difference, continues his painstaking work of expos As for the points of criticism occasionally raised against a non-Jaina system they seem to have been balanced by an occasionally showered praise. In any case, Gandhi is not obsessed by the fact that each of the non-Jaina systems considered by him differs from Jainism more or less sharply on some questions or others.
Let us now take critical note of the facts about Indian Philosophy that Gandhi thought fit to convey to his American audience and of his manner of doing so. Gandhi has taken up for consideration the following systems : Sankhya, Yoga, Nyāya (and Vaiśesika), Mīmāṁsā, Vedānta, Buddhism and Jainism. And it will
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