The Realism of Universals in Plato and Nyāya

It has become commonplace in introductions to Indian philosophy to construe Plato’s discussion of forms (εἶδος/ἰδέα) and the treatment in Nyāya and Vaiśeṣika of universals (sāmānya/jāti) as addressing the same philosophical issue, albeit in somewhat different ways. While such a comparison of the similarities and differences has interest and value as an initial reconnaissance of what each says about common properties, an examination of the roles that universals play in the rest of their philosophical enquiries vitiates this commonplace. This paper draws upon the primary texts to identify the following metaphysical, epistemological, semantic and soteriological roles that universals play in the philosophy of Plato and of Nyāya and Vaiśeṣika:

Metaphysical: causal of the existence of x Metaphysical: constitutive of the identity/essence of x Epistemological: cognitively causal (i.e. of the cognition of one over many) Epistemological: epistemically causal (i.e. of knowledge of x) Semantic: necessary condition of speech and reason Epistemological: vindicatory of induction (Nyāya only) Metaphysical: explanatory of causation (Nyāya only) Soteriological: cathartic contemplation (Plato only)

These roles provide us with motivations or reasons to believe that universals exist. As we examine these motivations, we find pressures mounting against our assimilating Platonic forms and the universals of Nyāya and Vaiśeṣika in the discourse about common properties. It is especially when we appreciate the utterly different contribution that universals make in securing our highest welfare that we realize how Plato and the two sister schools are not so much talking somewhat differently about the same thing, but talking somewhat similarly about different things. This better understanding of this difference in these philosophies opens a route for our better understanding of their unique contributions in the ongoing dialogue of philosophy.     

A Śaiva Interpretation of the Satkāryavāda: The Sāṃkhya Notion of Abhivyakti and Its Transformation in the Pratyabhijñā Treatise

It is a well-known fact that the ?aiva nondualistic philosopher Utpaladeva (fl. c. 925–975) adopted the Sā?khya principle according to which the effect must exist in some way before the operation of its cause (satkāryavāda). Johannes Bronkhorst has highlighted the paradox inherent in this appropriation: Utpaladeva is a staunch supporter of the satkāryavāda, but whereas Sā?khya authors consider it as a means of proving the existence of an unconscious matter, the ?aiva exploits it so as to establish his monistic idealism, in perfect contradiction with the Sā?khya dualism of matter and consciousness. How does Utpaladeva achieve this complete reversal of meaning of the satkāryavāda? The present article argues that the elliptical verses of the ī?varapratyabhijñākārikā dealing with this issue have been partly misunderstood so far due to the loss of Utpaladeva’s own detailed commentary (Vivr?ti) on this passage: Abhinavagupta’s two commentaries, however terse in this respect, clearly show that a crucial part of Utpaladeva’s reasoning remains implicit in the verses. The article therefore attempts to reconstruct the gist of Utpaladeva’s strategy by having recourse to various other ?aiva sources, including Somānanda’s ?ivadr???i and Utpaladeva’s own commentary thereon. This examination shows that Utpaladeva’s appropriation of the satkāryavāda rests on a profound transformation of the Sā?khya notions of manifestation (abhivyakti) and potentiality (?akti), and that his criticism of the Sā?khya understanding of causality might target the ?aiva dualists as well as Sā?khya authors.     

An Inquiry into the Definition of tarka in Nyāya Tradition and Its Connotation of Negative Speculation

Journal of Indian Philosophy - The technical term “tarka” in the Nyāya tradition is the object of the present investigation. Diverse texts including Buddhist ones exhibit a...     

Scholar Networks and the Manuscript Economy in Nyāya-śāstra in Early Colonial Bengal

Journal of Indian Philosophy - This essay engages with two large themes in order to address the social and intellectual practices of nyāya scholars in early colonial Bengal. First, I examine...     

Some Remarks on the Genesis of Central Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda Concepts

The present paper is a kind of selective summary of my book The Genesis of Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda (2014). [1.–2.] It deals with questions of origin and early development of three basic concepts of this school, viz., the ‘idealist’ thesis that the whole world is mind only (cittamātra) or manifestation only (vijñaptimātra), the assumption of a subliminal layer of the mind (ālayavijñāna), and the analysis of phenomena in terms of the “Three Natures” (svabhāvatraya). [3.] It has been asserted (H. Buescher) that these three basic concepts are logically inseparable and therefore must have been introduced conjointly. [4.] Still, from Vasubandhu onward treatises have been written in which only one of the three concepts is advocated or demonstrated to be indispensable, without any reference to the other two being made. Likewise, in most of the earlier Yogācāra treatises, the three concepts occur in different sections or contexts, or are even entirely absent, as vijñaptimātra in the Yogācārabhūmi (except for the Sa?dhinirmocanasūtra quotation) and ālayavijñāna in the Mahāyānasūtrāla?kāra and Madhyāntavibhāga. [5.] It is therefore probable that the three concepts were introduced separately and for different reasons. [5.1.] As regards the concept of the “Three Natures”, I very hypothetically suggest that it was stimulated by the Tattvārthapa?ala of the Bodhisatvabhūmi. [5.2.1.] In the case of ālayavijñāna, I still think that my hypothesis that the concept (term + idea) originated from a problem emerging in connection with the “attainment of cessation” (nirodhasamāpatti) holds good and has not been conclusively refuted, but I admit that Prof. Yamabe?s hypothesis is a serious alternative. [5.2.2.] An important point is that in the Yogācārabhūmi we come across two fundamentally different concepts of ālayavijñāna, the starting point for the change being, probably, the fifth chapter of the Sa?dhinirmocanasūtra. [5.3.] As for ‘idealism’, we may have to distinguish two strands, which, however, tend to merge. [5.3.1.] The earlier one uses the concept cittamātra and emerges as early as in the Pratyutpanna-buddha-sa?mukhāvasthita-samādhi-sūtra in connection with an interpretation of visions of the Buddha Amitāyus. [5.3.2.] The later strand introduces the concept vijñaptimātra and seems to have originated in the eighth chapter of the Sa?dhinirmocanasūtra in connection with a reflection on the images perceived in insight meditation. [5.3.3.] In texts like the Mahāyānasūtrāla?kāra, concepts from other Mahāyānasūtra strands (like abhūtaparikalpa) become prominent in this connection, and it is only in the Mahāyānasa?graha that the use of vijñaptimātra is finally established.     

The Three Natures and the Path to Liberation in Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda Thought

This paper provides a new interpretation of the three natures theory of Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda thought by means of an examination of the path theory associated with it, which has not been previously examined in scholarly literature. The paper first examines this path theory in a number of foundational texts to show that the widely accepted pivotal model is not in fact the three natures model that predominates in foundational Yogācāra-Vijñānavāda literature. Second, the paper offers a new interpretation of the three natures theory as providing a new causal model of the arising of suffering, and a corresponding theory of its cessation. This new causal model both makes possible the continued use of the kind of dharma analysis that Abhidharma thought employs to provide a causal analysis of the arising of suffering, and also couches such dharma analysis within the Mahāyāna framework of the emptiness of dharmas.     

Remarks on the Visuddhimagga,and on its treatment of the Memory of Former Dwelling(s) (pubbenivāsānussatiñāṇa)

Journal of Indian Philosophy -     

Svabhāvavāda and the Cārvāka/Lokāyata: A Historical Overview

svabh??va (own being) and yad?chh?? (chance, accident) are named as two different claimants among others as the first cause (jagatk??ra?a) in the ?vUp. But in later works, such as A?vagho?a??s poems, svabh??va is synonymous with yad?chh?? and entails a passive attitude to life. Later still, svabh??va is said to be inhering in the Lok??yata materialist system, although in which sense??cosmic order or accident??is not always clearly mentioned. Svabh??va is also a part of the S???khya doctrine and is mentioned in the medical compilations. It is proposed that the idea of svabh??va as cosmic order became a part of Lok??yata between the sixth and the eighth century ce and got widely accepted by the tenth century, so much so that in the fourteenth century S??ya?a-M??dhava aka Vidy??ra?ya could categorically declare that the C??rv??ka/Lok??yata upheld causality, not chance. But the other meaning of svabh??va, identical with yad?chh??, continued to circulate along with k??la, time, which was originally another claimant for the title of the first cause and similarly had acquired several significations in course of time. Both significations of svabh??va continued to be employed by later writers, and came to be used in another domain, that of daiva (fate) vis-à-vis puru?ak??ra (manliness or human endeavour).     

A South Indian ?ākta Anthropogon?: An Annotated Translation of Selections from Mahe?varānanda’s Mahārthama?jarīparimala, gāthās 19 and 20

This article represents the first of a projected series of annotated translations of the Mahārthama?jarīparimala of Maheśvarānanda, a Śaiva Śākta author active in Cidambaram around the turn of the fourteenth century of the Common Era. The present translation includes excerpts from the text’s presentation of two of the levels of reality (tattvas), puruṣa and prakṛti. These two tattvas, the apex of the older Sāṃkhya scheme incorporated centuries earlier by the Śaivas, provide for Maheśvarānanda the centerpiece and climax of his understanding of the structure of the Śaiva cosmos. Fundamental to the rhetoric of Maheśvarānanda’s idiosyncratic presentation is his reliance upon a simultaneous strategy of integration and distinction of his argument within the wider world of Śaiva doctrinal common sense. He seeks to integrate the characteristic meditative structure of his Krama or Mahārtha system within a theological framework shared by all Śaiva theists. It can be seen that Maheśvarānanda’s interpretation of the junction between these two reality levels delineates a picture of what it is to be a human being, equipped with an inner life and a personality. The article also reviews the quality of the published editions of the Mahārthama?jarī, discusses its textual history, and offers a number of suggested emendations to the passages translated.     

A note on the nyāya fallacy sādhyasama and petitio principii

Journal of Indian Philosophy -     

Two Investigations on the Madhyamakakārikās and the Vigrahavyāvartanī

Purpose of the article is to provide support for the contention that two fundamental treatises representing the teaching of Madhyamaka, viz. the Mūlamadhyamakakārikās and the Vigrahavyāvartanī, were designed to establish and justify a metaphysical tenet claiming that no particulars of any kind can exist on some level of final analysis and that this was the only primary concern of those works. Whereas the former text is in the first place dedicated to providing proofs of the central metaphysical thesis the major objective of the second treatise lies in a defense of the claim against possible objections. A correlate of this view regarding the content of those two works is on the one hand that the philosophy of the founder of the Madhyamaka-school essentially consists in a metaphysical teaching implying a radical rejection of a stance propagated in earlier Buddhist schools according to which objects of ordinary experience could be reduced to or explained by the existence of other sorts of particulars that can be theoretically postulated. On the other hand the exegesis advocated in the article implies that theorems pertaining to the nature of language or the relationship between language and non-linguistic reality are not at all a predominant issue in the pertinent texts and presumably were not a major matter of concern of early Madhyamaka in general. Accordingly matters pertaining to questions of semantics attain relevance at best in the form of objective consequences which the metaphysical doctrine might entail. The paper focuses on the second chapter of the Mūlamadhyamakakārikās as well as the segment of the Vigrahavyāvartanī which deals with the first major problem, represented by the verses 1–4 and 21–29. The reason is that a detailed and thoroughgoing investigation of these two textual passages is suited to disprove a contention voiced by Western scholars who suppose that the teaching of the founder of Madhyamaka embodies a particular claim pertaining to the relationship between language and non-linguistic reality.