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THE CONCEPT OF PRAMĀNA IN JAINISM:
AN INTRODUCTION
Narendra Kumar Dash
The present paper entitled “The concept of pramāņa in jainism : an introduction" consists of two parts. The former part bears a detailed study on the definitions of pramāņa given by various jaina philosophers and the later part gives some elementary informations regarding pratyakșa and parokşa, the two pramāņas accepted by the jaina logicians.
In jainism the source of valid knowledge (pramā) is technically called pramānal and pramā means right knowledge or true cognition of an object. knowledge in general (jñāna) may be true or false, but pramā is always true?. Though all most all the schools of Indian philosophy admit that pramā means valid knowledge, still they differ regarding the validity of knowledge. While the Naiyayikas regard true knowledge as true presentational knowledge tadvati tatprakara jñānams, the Bhäțţa Mimānsakas hold that truth of knowledge consists in non contradictoriness; i. e. pramå is defined as uncontradicted knowledge whose object was not known before (anadhigata“). On the other hand, the Jaina philosophers suggest that judgmental knowledge which is other than doubt, error etc. is true knowledge.5 Thus Hemacandra (12th Century A. D.), the great Jaina scholar suggests that right judgement about an object is called pramae.
True knowledge (pramā) is generated through pramāna and therefore, pramāna is usually rendered as: 'Instrument of knowledge' or 'Authoritative evidences'. The Nyāyavārttika of Udyotakara defines it as : upalabdhi-hetuh pramānam? i. e. pramāna is a cause or condition of knowledge or cognition. The pramāņa is so to say the window of the mind, through which the objective world communicates its existence to us.
The word pramāņa is derived from the root vmā (n) means 'to measure' DP. II, 53 along with the prefix "pra'. Then the suffix
(1) yu (!)' is added here in the sense of karana and the -yu- portion of the suffix is changed to '-ana-' by p VII, 1, 1. Thus we get the • Senior Research Fellow, Dept. of Sanskrit, Visva Bharati University.
Santiniketan-731235
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