Vaishali Institute Research Bulletin 1

Author(s): Nathmal Tatia
Publisher: Research Institute of Prakrit Jainology & Ahimsa Mujjaffarpur

Page 111

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VAISHALI INSTITUTE RESEARCH BULLETIN NO. I
dispute, a proved fact. To this contention the Jaina proposes the following consideration as an effective rejoinder. Now it must be admitted that clear, vivid perception of all existent facts is possible, because these facts are amenable to inference. Whatever is inferred must be capable of being known by perception just as fire is inferable and perceivable both. The existence of all things can be proved by inference. Whatever exists is subject to the transition of origin, cessation and continuity, because a thing to be real must have these incidents as inalienable characteristics. The nature of things is like a fingerbent, straightened and so on. In all the states the finger persists as a continued substance through these transitions. This inference of the relativity of all existents points to the possibility of direct transcendent intuition. It may be urged that if a person does not feel inclined to verify this inference by perceptual cognition, the argument of the inevitable co-occurrence of perception and inference breaks down. Well, this is no objection at all since our contention is that a thing which is amenable to inference is also amenable to perception. If perception does not materialize, it does not affect the validity of the argument.
We may arrive at the same conclusion by following another line of argument. The self is susceptible of total purification by the application of suitable expedients. Whatever is susceptible to the application of purificants is competent to reach the state of purification. Gold, jewels and such-like things are susceptible to purification by application of soda, rubbing with mud, and burning heat in a hermetically sealed vessel. The self is susceptible to the application of the purificatory method of repeated contemplation, knowledge and also practice of austerities. But how can you posit that these mental excercises are the competent condition of the purification of the self? The answer is that it is the clear testimony of our experience. We know that by repeated perception a thing is known to become progressively clearer and clearer. By the application of specifically efficient processes of closer perception a thing can be known in its entirety.
It has been contended by Kumirila and his followers that there is no proof of an omniscient person. But the dogmatic denial of omniscience presupposes omniscience on the part of the arguer. A thing can be denied if it is possible and known to be such. When you take the agnostic attitude and deny that all the infinite plurality of things cannot be cognized by any person, your denial betrays your knowledge of those things which you deny. Certainly a man with a modicum of sanity cannot feel the necessity of denying a fiction. It is only a fact and an existent fact at that which can be asserted or