A History of Indian Philosophy, Vol. 1 by Surendranath Dasgupta (best e reader for manga .TXT) 📖

the Tîrtha@nkara which first entered the womb of the Brahmin lady Devanandâ was then transferred to the womb of Trîs'alâ. This story the Digambaras do not believe as we have already seen. His parents were the worshippers of Pârs'va and gave him the name Varddhamâna (Vîra or Mahâvîra). He married Yas'odâ and had a daughter by her. In his thirtieth year his parents died and with the permission of his brother Nandivardhana he became a monk. After twelve years of self-mortification and meditation he attained omniscience (kevala, cf. bodhi of the Buddhists). He lived to preach for forty-two years more, and attained mok@sa (emancipation) some years before Buddha in about 480 B.C. [Footnote ref 2].

The Fundamental Ideas of Jaina Ontology.

A thing (such as clay) is seen to assume various shapes and to undergo diverse changes (such as the form of a jug, or pan, etc.), and we have seen that the Chândogya Upani@sad held that since in all changes the clay-matter remained permanent, that alone was true, whereas the changes of form and state were but appearances, the nature of which cannot be rationally

_________________________________________________________________

[Footnote 1: See Jacobi's article on Jainism, E. R.E.]

[Footnote 2: See Hoernlé's translation of Uvâsagadasâo, Jacobi, loc. cit., and Hoernlé's article on the Âjîvakas, E. R.E. The S'vetâmbaras, however, say that this date was 527 B.C. and the Digambaras place it eighteen years later.]

174

demonstrated or explained. The unchangeable substance (e.g. the clay-matter) alone is true, and the changing forms are mere illusions of the senses, mere objects of name (nâma-rûpa) [Footnote ref 1]. What we call tangibility, visibility, or other sense-qualities, have no real existence, for they are always changing, and are like mere phantoms of which no conception can be made by the light of reason.

The Buddhists hold that changing qualities can alone be perceived and that there is no unchanging substance behind them. What we perceive as clay is but some specific quality, what we perceive as jug is also some quality. Apart from these qualities we do not perceive any qualitiless substance, which the Upani@sads regard as permanent and unchangeable. The permanent and unchangeable substance is thus a mere fiction of ignorance, as there are only the passing collocations of qualities. Qualities do not imply that there are substances to which they adhere, for the so-called pure substance does not exist, as it can neither be perceived by the senses nor inferred. There are only the momentary passing qualities. We should regard each change of quality as a new existence.

The Jains we know were the contemporaries of Buddha and possibly of some of the Upani@sads too, and they had also a solution to offer. They held that it was not true that substance alone was true and qualities were mere false and illusory appearances. Further it was not true as the Buddhists said that there was no permanent substance but merely the change of passing qualities, for both these represent two extreme views and are contrary to experience. Both of them, however, contain some elements of truth but not the whole truth as given in experience. Experience shows that in all changes there are three elements: (1) that some collocations of qualities appear to remain unchanged; (2) that some new qualities are generated; (3) that some old qualities are destroyed. It is true that qualities of things are changing every minute, but all qualities are not changing. Thus when a jug is made, it means that the clay-lump has been destroyed, a jug has been generated and the clay is permanent, i.e. all production means that some old qualities have been lost, some new ones brought in, and there is some part in it which is permanent The clay has become lost in some form, has generated itself in another, and remained permanent in still

__________________________________________________________________

[Footnote 1: See Chândogya, VI. 1.]

175

another form. It is by virtue of these unchanged qualities that a thing is said to be permanent though undergoing change. Thus when a lump of gold is turned into a rod or a ring, all the specific qualities which come under the connotation of the word "gold" are seen to continue, though the forms are successively changed, and with each such change some of its qualities are lost and some new ones are acquired. Such being the case, the truth comes to this, that there is always a permanent entity as represented by the permanence of such qualities as lead us to call it a substance in spite of all its diverse changes. The nature of being (sat) then is neither the absolutely unchangeable, nor the momentary changing qualities or existences, but involves them both. Being then, as is testified by experience, is that which involves a permanent unit, which is incessantly every moment losing some qualities and gaining new ones. The notion of being involves a permanent (dhruva) accession of some new qualities (utpâda) and loss of some old qualities (vyaya) [Footnote ref.1]. The solution of Jainism is thus a reconciliation of the two extremes of Vedantism and Buddhism on grounds of common-sense experience.

The Doctrine of Relative Pluralism (anekântavâda).

This conception of being as the union of the permanent and change brings us naturally to the doctrine of Anekântavâda or what we may call relative pluralism as against the extreme absolutism of the Upani@sads and the pluralism of the Buddhists. The Jains regarded all things as anekânta (na-ekânta), or in other words they held that nothing could be affirmed absolutely, as all affirmations were true only under certain conditions and limitations. Thus speaking of a gold jug, we see that its existence as a substance (dravya) is of the nature of a collocation of atoms and not as any other substance such as space (âkâs'a), i.e. a gold jug is a dravya only in one sense of the term and not in every sense; so it is a dravya in the sense that it is a collocation of atoms and not a dravya in the sense of space or time (kâla). It is thus both a dravya and not a dravya at one and the same time. Again it is atomic in the sense that it is a composite of earth-atoms and not atomic in the sense that it is

___________________________________________________________________

[Footnote: 1: See Tattvârthâdhigamasûtra, and Gu@naratna's treatment of
Jainism in @Sa@ddars'anasamuccaya.]

176

not a composite of water-atoms. Again it is a composite of earth-atoms only in the sense that gold is a metallic modification of earth, and not any other modification of earth as clay or stone. Its being constituted of metal-atoms is again true in the sense that it is made up of gold-atoms and not of iron-atoms. It is made up again of gold-atoms in the sense of melted and unsullied gold and not as gold in the natural condition. It is again made up of such unsullied and melted gold as has been hammered and shaped by the goldsmith Devadatta and not by Yajñadatta. Its being made up of atoms conditioned as above is again only true in the sense that the collocation has been shaped as a jug and not as a pot and so on. Thus proceeding in a similar manner the Jains say that all affirmations are true of a thing only in a certain limited sense. All things (vastu) thus possess an infinite number of qualities (anantadharmâtmaka@m vastu), each of which can only be affirmed in a particular sense. Such an ordinary thing as a jug will be found to be the object of an infinite number of affirmations and the possessor of an infinite number of qualities from infinite points of view, which are all true in certain restricted senses and not absolutely [Footnote ref l]. Thus in the positive relation riches cannot be affirmed of poverty but in the negative relation such an affirmation is possible as when we say "the poor man has no riches." The poor man possesses riches not in a positive but in a negative way. Thus in some relation or other anything may be affirmed of any other thing, and again in other relations the very same thing cannot be affirmed of it. The different standpoints from which things (though possessed of infinite determinations) can be spoken of as possessing this or that quality or as appearing in relation to this or that, are technically called naya [Footnote ref 2].

The Doctrine of Nayas.

In framing judgments about things there are two ways open to us, firstly we may notice the manifold qualities and characteristics of anything but view them as unified in the thing; thus when we say "this is a book" we do not look at its characteristic qualities as being different from it, but rather the qualities or characteristics are perceived as having no separate existence from

____________________________________________________________________

[Footnote 1: See Gu@naratna on Jainamata in @Sa@ddarsanasamuccaya, pp. 211. etc., and also Tattvârthâdhigamasûtra.]

[Footnote 2: See Tattvârthâdhigamasûtra, and Vis'e@sâvalyaka bhâ@sya, pp. 895-923.]

177

the thing. Secondly we may notice the qualities separately and regard the thing as a mere non-existent fiction (cf. the Buddhist view); thus I may speak of the different qualities of the book separately and hold that the qualities of things are alone perceptible and the book apart from these cannot be found. These two points of view are respectively called dravyanaya and paryâyanaya [Footnote ref 1]. The dravyanaya again shows itself in three forms, and paryayanaya in four forms, of which the first form only is important for our purposes, the other three being important rather from the point of view of grammar and language had better be omitted here. The three nayas under dravyanaya are called naigama-naya, sa@mgraha-naya and vyavahâra-naya.

When we speak of a thing from a purely common sense point of view, we do not make our ideas clear or precise. Thus I may hold a book in my hand and when asked whether my hands are empty, I may say, no, I have something in my hand, or I may say, I have a book in my hand. It is evident that in the first answer I looked at the book from the widest and most general point of view as a "thing," whereas in the second I looked at it in its special existence as a book. Again I may be reading a page of a book, and I may say I am reading a book, but in reality I was reading only one of the pages of the book. I may be scribbling on loose sheets, and may say this is my book on Jaina philosophy, whereas in reality there were no books but merely some loose sheets. This looking at things from the loose common sense view, in which we do not consider them from the point of view of their most general characteristic as "being" or as any of their special characteristics, but simply as they appear at first sight, is technically called the naigama standpoint. This empirical view probably proceeds on the assumption that a thing possesses the most general as well as the most special qualities, and hence we may lay stress on any one of these at any time and ignore the other ones. This is the point of view from which according to the Jains the Nyâya and Vais'e@sika schools interpret experience.

Sa@mgraha-naya is the looking at things merely from the most general point of view. Thus we may speak of all individual things from their most general and fundamental aspect as "being." This according to the Jains is the Vedânta way of looking at things.

___________________________________________________________________

[Footnote 1: Syâdvâdama@njarî, pp. 171-173.]

178

The vyavahâra-naya standpoint holds that the real essence of things is to be regarded from the point of view of actual practical experience of the thing, which unifies within it some general as well as some special traits, which has been existing from past times and remain in the future, but yet suffer trifling changes all the while, changes which are serviceable to us in a thousand ways. Thus a "book" has no doubt some general traits, shared by all books, but it has some special traits as well. Its atoms are continually suffering some displacement and rearrangement, but yet it has been existing as a book for some time past and will exist for some time in the future as well. All these characteristics, go to make up the essence of the "book" of our everyday experience, and none of these can be separated and held up as being the concept of a "book." This according to the Jains is the Sâ@mkhya way of looking at things.

The first view of paryâya-naya called @rjusûtra is the Buddhist view which does not believe in the existence of the thing in the past or in the future, but holds that a thing is a mere conglomeration of characteristics which may be said to produce effects at any given moment. At each new moment there