World of Philosophy

Author(s): Christopher Key Chapple, Intaj Malek, Dilip Charan, Sunanda Shastri, Prashant Dave
Publisher: Shanti Prakashan

Page 833

reality, state that philosophers of other schools of thought emphasize only one aspect of reality-describing it as either one or many, real or unreal, universal or particular, thus represent partial truth and the anekāntavāda, according to which reality is neither absolutely real nor unreal, neither one nor many, neither particular nor universal, neither identical nor different, but both real and unreal, one and many, particular and universal, unity and diversity, from different points of view, reveals complete truth. To obtain complete truth, there is no other way, except admitting the anekānta path. It reconciles and assimilates all the partial view-points of other schools of thought. The word anekānta itself indicates its style of reconciliation. This word makes it very clear that 'many' is not diametrically opposite of 'one', for many includes one. It means different one-sided views (ekānta) are, thus, only constituents of the anekānta only. It is a philosophy of synthesis and emerges out of the examination of the partial truths of other systems. 10
Reconciliation of divergent philosophical view-points is not an easy task and it poses many problems. To solve this difficult problem, Jaina thinkers have developed nayavāda in which views of different philosophical systems are individually accommodated and syādvāda which reconciles all of them giving complete picture of reality. Both these doctrines are the two faces of the same coin, viz. anekāntavāda. 'As a philosophical methodology, it takes its flight on the two wings of nayavāda, the doctrine of stand-points and saptabhangi, the doctrine of seven-fold predication.'11
Philosophical understanding is generated by both pramānas and nayas.12 Syādvāda reveals the thing as a whole, thus, it is called pramāņavākya (sakalādeśa) while naya reveals only a portion of it (vikalādeśa).13 A pramāna is like an ocean while naya as are simply like ocean-water kept in different pitchers A pramăna can be reached through aggregation of all the constituent stand-points.14
Naya means the points of view which gives only partial truth about reality.15A When we present only one aspect of many-sided reality supressing others, then it falls under the nayavāda, the doctrine of view-points. Traditionally, the Jainas mention seven or six kinds of nayas, taking into account, the different philosophical views, prevalent in ancient India They are : naigama, samgraha. Vyavahāra, rjusūtra, śabda, samabhirūdha and evambhūta.15B Again these nayas are fundamentally divided into two main categories viz. dravyāstika,
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