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permanence. One can neither speak of absolutely unchanging permanence nor of absolute change without permanence. The reality, however, maintains identity and permanence though it expresses itself in multiple forms. So Anekanta, which forms the foundation of all thought in Jain philosophy and from which the general theory of a pluralistic universe has emerged, is unity in multiplicity.
To go back a little in time, we find ourselves in the 6th century BC. Scholars have called this period the period of second urbanization. This period comes after the first urbanization that is dated to the Indus Valley civilization and the intervening Dark Ages that is timed between 1750 BC and 700-600 BC. It is said that in the first period of Urbanization the third primary center was the ancient Indus Valley civilization. When they became extinct due to many and complex reasons, there came a period that does not seem to boast of any intellectual development. Around 700-600 BC., the whole world was in what is termed as an intellectual turmoil. Socrates in Greece, Zoroaster in Persia, Confucius in China were some of the major intellectual thinkers. But to take the case of India alone, this period is recorded as one where thinkers were wanting earnestly to explore newer avenues for understanding the mystery of man and the universe. Of couse, the three major schools were the Vedantists, the Buddhists and the Jainas.
Lord Mahavira was the Jain seer who is considered to be the last of the 24 Thirthankaras and lived in the latter part of the sixth century BC. (599-527 BC). The first Jain Tirthankara is believed to be Lord Rishabha. The corpus of Jain canonical literature is called the Agamas. Here, the word Anekanta is, according to Acharya Mahaprajna, not mentioned
Anekanta has emerged from two forms: perspective and substantial. The vision that understands one change of matter is a perspective and that which comprehends infinite contradictory changes in matter is the substantial. In Jain philosophy the branch of perspective knowledge grew first and that of substantial knowledge developed later. In the times of Bhagwan Mahavir, it was the perspective school that was popular.
Anekanta also called syadvad where syat is a cautionary prefix which means that from one perspective. Or from one point of view. Vad could be understood as assertion of possibilities or discussion. To make the definition more concise, syad is a term used to indicate relativity. Some scholars say that Syadvad is first mentioned by that name in Bhardrabahu's writings. There were two authors by the same name, one belonging to 433-357 BC. and the other belonging to about 375 BC. 110 0
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