Vaishali Institute Research Bulletin 1

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

Page 34

NATURE OF VALID COGNITION
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No difficulty arises if it is endorsed that a cognition comes into existence as self-certifying and is never unknown in its career. This is called self-illumination of the cognition (svaprakasatva or svabhāsitua as worded by Siddhasena). It means that all cognitions are selfcognitions. A difficulty has been raised by the opponent that if the cognition or the knowing-self is cognized by itself it will come to mean that the subject of cognition is also its object. The object is one that receives a benefit from the act. Though Jknow is a transitive verb and as such necessarily involves an object to operate upon, the subject cannot be the object as it is not a different thing to receive the benefit of illumination from the cognitive act. If the subject were also the object the sword which cuts the tree will also cut itself. This is obviously absurd. However expert an acrobat may be, he cannot dance on his own shoulder. Such is the case with cognition. This is the line of objection taken by Nagarjuna and Candrakirti who quote statements of scriptures in their support. To avoid prolixity we must say that cognition is not an action though it is enunciated as a verb by the grammarian. But the meaning of all verbs is not action. Cognition is rather regarded as a quality by the Nyāya-Vaiseşika school. Without entering into the controversy whether it is an action or quality, we can dispose of the objection by the observation that the self or cognition (as the Buddhist does not believe in the knowing self) is not the object of the cognition but is self-revealing in the sense that it is never unknown. If the self were unknown at any time it would be subject to doubt. But nobody entertains the doubt about himself as to whether
I exist or not' or the erroneous perception 'I do not exist'. However much the sceptic may try to deny the existence of the knowing self, he only stultifies himself The assertion of the doubt or the negation of the self presupposes the very existence of the self as the subject of assertion. He entangles himself in hopeless self-contradiction. When the sceptic asserts 'I do not know the knower', he asserts himself to be the knower of the non-existence of the knower. This means that the knower is known as the knowing subject and never as an alien object.!
Pramāra has been defined as a cognition having the above-noted characteristics. The word pramāra in Samskrit means both the result and the instrument of knowledge. A thing is accepted to exist on the basis of the cognition serving as the proof of it. This cognition must be valid, otherwise it will fail to function as proof. But wh
1. For a further detailed exposition, the inquisitive reader is referred to the
author's monograph: The Absolutist's Standpoint in Logic in the Nava Nalandā Mahavihāra Research Vol. I.