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EXAMINATION OF THE DOCTRINE OF TRAIKĀLYA'.
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up the view of the utter annihilation of the Past and its Effects ; it is in view of this possibility that the Lord has said that the Act persists'.
Otherwise if the Past really persisted, then how could we explain the teaching in the aphorism where we are taught that ' in reality all is void'?
As a matter of fact, when the Eye is produced, it does not come from any. where ; similarly when it is destroyed, it does not go away to any other place ; what happens is thatafter having been not in existence, it comes into existence, and having come into existence, it again becomes non-existent.--It might be urged that-"in the Present state, it comes into existence, after having not been in existence " That is not so ; because the State' is not any. thing different from the entity (Eye); as is clear from the assertion that these same (things) are the States and they exist as such.-If it be meant that, "not having been itself, it becomes itself” then it would be established that there can be no future Eye.-Further, if the Modifications are always there, the Cause and Effect would not be there ; which would mean that there is no fixed Truth; and this would imply the absence of the two paths of "Repression' (Purification) also ; and thus the four Truths being non-existent, there would be no possibility of True Knowledge, Renunciation, Direct Intuition and Meditation. These being not there, there would be nonexistence also of the Pudgalas (Bodies) which are near about the regions where the Fruit of Acts come about. This would put an end to all Teaching.
-From all this it follows that the assumption of Past' and 'Future things is not wholesome.-(1852)
It has been asked by the Opponent (under Text 1789)"How have Mystics distinct cognitions of the Past and Future ?"
The answer to this is as follows:
TEXTS (1853-1856).
THE MYSTICS COGNISE THAT FORM OF THE PRESENT' THING WHICH,
DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY, HAS BECOME EITHER AN EFFECT, OR A CAUSE; SUBSEQUENTLY, THEY FOLLOW IT UP WITH conceptual cogni. tions, WHICH ARE PURELY COMMON (SECULAR) IN CHARACTER, AND WHICH ARE REALLY WITHOUT OBJECTS (WITHOUT A REAL OBJECTIVE BACK-GROUND).-THUS IT IS THAT, ON THE BASIS OF THE SAID PAST AND FUTURE SERIES OF CAUSES AND EFFECTS, PROCEED ALL TEACHINGS REGARDING THE PAST AND THE FUTURE.-AS FOR THE Tathāgata HIMSELF, HIS TEACHINGS PROCEED WITHOUT CIRCUMLOCUTION; BECAUSE THE SERIES OF HIS COGNITIONS ARE ENTIRELY DEVOID OF THE WEBS OF CONCEPTUAL CONTENT.(1853-1856)
COMMENTARY.
Past ',--and Cause
It has become the Effect' in relation to the in relation to the 'Future.
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