The Contribution of the Agamas

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By admin | March 2, 2009

The Validity of Scriptural Knowledge – Except the Carvakas, all systems of Indian Philosophy admit the validity of scriptural knowledge. In the Vedic tradition, the Vedas which are regarded as impersonal, constitute the highest authority of religion. In the tradition of the Sramanic culture of Buddhism and Jainism, the authority of scriptures rests with their prophets, who are supposed to be Omniscient as well above all desires and aversions. In the Jaina tradition, the validity of the scripture is accorded at par with direct perception since the scriptural knowledge is knowledge gained by the Omniscient being, who has directly perceived the reality.

Thus scriptural knowledge is also definite and indubious like the omniscient knowledge. This is admitted by Samantabhadra in his Apta-Mimamsa. It should also be noted that the knowledge and practice of Scriptures (Agamas) also leads to the attainment of Kevala-jnana, so as to the knower of the Srutas are called Sruta-kevalin. Anybody and everybody cannot be Srut a. In order to be a Sruta, he must fulfill the conditions of becoming desireless (Vitaraga) and he must destroy the Karmas which obscure the real nature of Sruta. Only then, such a Scriptural knowledge serves like the bliss.

According to the Vedic tradition, the Vedas manifest their own validity. Words used by us, according to them, denote things that can be cognised by other means of knowledge, and, if we cannot know them through other means, then those who utter them must be of unquestionable authority. So non-Vedic utterances cannot possess any inherent validity. According to Prabhakara, such non-Verbal knowledge is of the nature of inference because only the verbal cognition of the Vedas is strictly verbal. The Vedic thinkers adopt the doctrine of impersonate authorship perhaps to maintain is infallibility, because a person is liable to many defects. However, in order to prove the impersonal authorship of the Vedas, the Vedic thinkers; especially the Mimamsakas introduce a mystical theory of the eternality of the Vedas. They hold that the relationship between the word and its meaning is natural and not created by conversion.

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