4148018

Specifying the Nature of Substance in Aristotle and in Indian PhilosophyAuthor(s): Hugh R. NicholsonSource: Philosophy East and West, Vol. 54, No. 4 (Oct., 2004), pp. 533-553Published by: University of Hawai'i PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4148018 .

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SPECIFYING THE NATURE OF SUBSTANCE IN ARISTOTLE AND IN INDIAN PHILOSOPHY

Hugh R. Nicholson Department of Religion, Coe College

Aristotle's Concept of Substance as a Vague Category

According to the contemporary philosopher and comparative religionist Robert C. Neville, cross-cultural comparison calls for the formulation of class concepts or cate-

gories with respect to which divergent, even contradictory, ideas can brought to- gether and compared. Borrowing terminology from Charles S. Peirce, Neville terms such concepts "vague categories," thereby drawing attention to the lack of speci- ficity that allows for comparison between potentially contradictory ideas.' They differ from categories that are merely general, that is, those that presuppose and express a

degree of similarity between the ideas they encompass.2 Ordinarily, these vague categories are not waiting to be found in the philosophi-

cal or religious traditions themselves. Rather, it is the task of the scholar to formulate these vague categories and then to translate the particular ideas in the compared traditions into the language of the vague category. Vague categories are essentially hypotheses worked up in the laboratory of the comparativist,3 and, as hypotheses, their value lies in their ability to generate unbiased and illuminating comparisons between traditions.

In the philosophy of Aristotle, however, there can be found such an unspecified category that, like metals such as copper and gold that are occasionally found free in nature, requires little effort to isolate and identify. This is the concept of substance (ousia) as it appears in Aristotle's investigation into the nature of being in the Central Books (Zeta, Eta, and Theta) of the Metaphysics. Aristotle's project here implies a formal definition of substance. Substance (ousia), as the primary sense of being's many senses, denotes that which is most real. Thus, whatever in the course of Aris- totle's discussion is determined to be most real is, by definition, ousia. The investigation found in the Metaphysics, then, can be understood as a series of attempts to specify-to fill with content-the vague category ousia. Eventually Aristotle will identify ousia with both the substratum (hupokeimenon) and the essence (to ti 6n einai), neither of which alone, however, fully accounts for the meaning of the term "substance." Since these two candidates are not mutually consistent species, the category "substance" is vague, not general, in Neville's sense.

This understanding of Aristotle's concept of substance as something like a Nevillian vague category suggests that it might be useful in cross-cultural comparison. To be specific, as I hope to demonstrate in this essay, the attempt to understand certain discussions in Indian metaphysics in terms of Aristotle's project of specifying a vague, pre-thematic understanding of reality can shed light on some of the basic

Philosophy East & West Volume 54, Number 4 October 2004 533-553 533 ? 2004 by University of Hawai'i Press



tensions and presuppositions of these discussions. In the pages that follow, I hope to show that two fundamental tensions exist in common in Aristotelian and Indian metaphysical speculation. First I shall argue that in his understanding of reality Aris- totle struggles with the tension (a) between reality conceived in terms of the underlying substrate on the one hand and "thisness" on the other and (b) between reality conceived as a "thisness" on the one hand and "whatness" on the other. I shall proceed to argue that the first of these tensions can be found in the Indian concept of dravya, "substance," and the second in the concept of vastu, "real thing." Although the Indian thinkers I shall discuss, namely Patafijali and Kumdrila, attempt to resolve these tensions somewhat differently than Aristotle does, we shall see that underlying these tensions is the same basic problem, namely the need to reconcile the change- able nature of the sensible world with the demand that there be something stable and enduring in reality corresponding to the structures of our speech and thought.

The Specification of the Nature of Substance in Aristotle's Metaphysics

Being, as the familiar refrain in the Metaphysics goes, is said in many ways, and the primary or focal sense of being-that to which all the other senses of being ultimately refer-is substance, ousia. Thus, the long-standing and vexing question of being is reducible to the question of substance.4 A determination of the nature of substance is Aristotle's concern in the Central Books of the Metaphysics.

As mentioned above, the concept of ousia is best understood as a kind of place- holder. According to James H. Lesher, "'substance' functions as an honorific term, reserved only for that which is most fundamentally real; and although the candidates for the honor may change, the nature of the award does not."5 In everyday understanding, in default of philosophical reflection, the term is associated most strongly with physical bodies, since these convey a self-evident impression of reality.6 How- ever, in keeping with Aristotle's characteristic method of beginning with what is most apparent to us to arrive at what is most intelligible by nature, the reader following Aristotle's metaphysical investigations will gradually be weaned away from this everyday sense of what is most real. Aristotle will, in fact, ultimately reject as true substances some of those putatively substantial physical things he mentions at the beginning of Book Z, chapter 2, such as the four elements and the parts of animals.7

In Metaphysics Z, chapter 3, Aristotle introduces four candidates for substance: the essence (to ti 6n einai), the universal (to katholou), the genus (to genos), and the substrate (to hupokeimenon). Each of these has had an association with the notion of substance in previous philosophical thought.8 He will test each of these candidates against four criteria for substance to determine which of them has the greatest claim to the title of substance.9 Three of these four criteria are incorporated into the definition of substance Aristotle gives in Categories 5. "A substance," he says there, "is that which is neither said of a subject nor in a subject, e.g. the individual man or

horse."'1 At the base of this definition is what could be called the "subject" criterion: a substance is that of which various things are said. The second criterion is

534 Philosophy East & West



implicit in Aristotle's statement here that substance is not "in" a subject (en hupo- keimen6i tini), or, in other words, that those qualities that depend for their being on the substance in which they inhere cannot themselves be called substances. Else- where he will call the criterion implicit in this statement the independence or separability (to ch6riston) criterion.11 Finally, Aristotle's mention in this definition of an individual man and an individual horse as examples of substance points to what can be called the "thisness" criterion: substance must signify a "this something" (tode ti).12

The fourth criterion for substance does not enter into Aristotle's definition of

primary substance in Categories 5 but will, as we shall see, emerge as the decisive criterion for substance in the Metaphysics.13 This is what can be called the intelligibility criterion, and it refers to the conviction that what is real in a thing is what

corresponds to the definition of what that thing is.14 Substance, the first and most fundamental of his ontological categories, is that which answers to the first question one asks of a thing, namely "What is it?" The "what-it-is" (to ti esti) of something denotes its substance.15

The First Stage in the Determination of Substance: The Ascendancy of the Thisness Criterion In the Categories there is no evidence of any tension between the understanding of substance as the ultimate subject of predication (to hupokeimenon) and the re-

quirement that substance be an independently existing individual thing (tode ti). The

logical works make no reference to the theory of form-matter composition, and thus there is no indication that the primary substance of the Categories has a complex structure. As an apparently indivisible entity, the primary substance is the most basic

reality;16 it is at once an individual thing and the ultimate subject. The later under-

standing of the individual sensible thing as a composite of matter and form, however, means that this, the primary substance of the Categories, is no longer ultimate. The ultimate subject (pr6ton hupokeimenon) and the primary substance (prot6 ousia) no longer coincide. The demonstration of the divergence between the individual substance and the ultimate substrate is found in Metaphysics Z, chapter 3.17

Metaphysics Z.3 demonstrates that a reliance on the subject criterion alone will result in the unsatisfactory conclusion that matter, which possesses neither individ-

uality nor independence, is substance. Aristotle begins this demonstration with a reformulation of the definition of substance given in Categories 5. The substance is redefined here in the Metaphysics as that of which various things are said and which itself cannot be predicated of a still more basic reality.18 A comparison of the two definitions reveals that the formulation in the Metaphysics has eliminated the refer- ences to the thisness and separability criteria that were incorporated into the Cate-

gories' definition. The elimination of these criteria is only provisional; the ultimate aim of the ensuing discussion will be, in fact, to demonstrate their overriding im- portance. Aristotle sets the stage for his demonstration with this reformulated definition, which represents a provisional understanding of substance in terms of the sub-

ject criterion alone.

Hugh R. Nicholson 535



Aristotle proceeds to argue that this definition of substance as the ultimate subject of predication invites a process of subtraction of predicates (periairesis) to isolate this ultimate subject. But when this process is carried out to its end, we find that "nothing remains" (ou ouden hupomenon).19 More precisely, what remains is the mysterious Aristotelian prime matter,20 which Aristotle defines as "that which in itself is neither a particular thing (m6te ti), nor a quality, nor designated by any of the categories which define being."21 Thus, the ultimate subject (to hupokeimenon pr6ton) falls completely outside the categories, including the first, which is substance (ousia). This line of reasoning thus exposes a rift between the subject criterion on the one hand and the thisness criterion on the other.22 The discovery that the ultimate subject as matter fails to fulfill the "thisness" criterion forces Aristotle to revise sig- nificantly the understanding of substance as primary substrate.

There is something insidious about Aristotle's subsequent revision. The utter failure of matter to fulfill the requirements of substance first leads Aristotle to consider the other component of the individual thing (the primary substance of the Categories), namely form.23 It is the form, not the underlying matter, that is responsible for the "thisness" of the individual thing. Here, in this consideration of the form component of the primary substance, Aristotle has not yet abandoned the subject criterion inasmuch as this, the primary substance, remains the subject of predication.

After a curiously abrupt end to Metaphysics Z.3, however, and after the textually out-of-place methodological interlude that begins chapter 4, Aristotle duly considers another candidate, the whatness or essence (to ti en einai). Yet the conformity of the previously discussed form and the essence-Aristotle will eventually identify the two24-tends to offset the fact that with the latter a new candidate is being considered; the substratum (to hupokeimenon) has been quietly, and perhaps reluctantly, set to one side. It is almost as if Aristotle (or whoever was responsible for the redac- tion of the text of the Metaphysics) structured the discussion in such a way as to avoid drawing attention to the demotion of the once-compelling subject criterion for substance. The substrate (hupokeimenon) will remain a correct determination of substance (ousia), but only in a secondary sense.25

The Second Stage: The Tension between Thisness and Whatness We have just seen how an affirmation of the thisness criterion serves as the basis for Aristotle's rejection of the primacy of the subject criterion. This leads Aristotle to direct his attention from matter as the ultimate substrate to the formal element of the sensible composite. Yet the thisness criterion only functions negatively to shift Aristotle's attention away from the understanding of ousia as the ultimate substratum. It cannot be what directs Aristotle toward the eventual understanding of the form or whatness as the primary instance of substance, for, in everyday thought anyway, the form is a type (to toinde), not an individual thing (tode ti).26 It is for this reason that the species, along with the genus, is relegated to the rank of secondary substance in the Categories. To explain Aristotle's eventual choice of the whatness as the primary instance of substance in the Metaphysics we need to posit the operation of another criterion, namely that of intelligibility. Although not acknowledged explicitly




by Aristotle, the intelligibility criterion guides the investigation in the Central Books like a silent undertow. Indeed, the whatness, eventually determined by Aristotle to be the most successful candidate for substance, is the candidate that fully meets this criterion.

There is, therefore, a certain degree of tension between the criteria of "thisness" and intelligibility, as well as the candidates corresponding to these two criteria, namely the individual thing (tode ti) and the whatness (to ti en einai). This tension between the individual substance and the intelligible form constitutes, in fact, what is perhaps the fundamental aporia of Aristotle's metaphysics.27 It arises from his attempt to wed a Platonic epistemology-expressed in the dictum that all knowledge is of the universal-with his own empiricist instinct that the most real things are sensible particulars.

So basic is this tension between these two criteria for substance that there is no reality in the sensible realm that meets both of them.28 Individual sensible things are intelligible only by virtue of the form (eidos) inhering in them. There is no definition of the sensible particular as such; particulars are distinguished from each other only by their accidents, not their essence.29 Only in the supersensible realm do we find realities that completely fulfill Aristotle's twin requirements for substance, namely that individuality and intelligibility, being and essence, coincide.30 These are the various self-movers corresponding to the perpetual and uniform motions proper to each of the celestial bodies. Each of these immaterial substances, unlike any sensible reality, is unique to its species.

According to this reading of Aristotle, the investigation into the nature of substance in the Metaphysics can be schematically represented as a movement passing through three distinct, although related, conceptions of substance. The conception of substance as the ultimate substratum yields to that of substance as the concrete, rounded-off reality to which one can point. This latter conception in turn leads to that of substance as the fully intelligible content of cognition. In the course of this movement, the previous conceptions are superseded but not discarded. The "sub- jectness" and thisness of substance are ultimately to be understood with reference to-and as qualified by-the dominant conception of substance as the "whatness."

This movement can thus be analyzed in two phases, each of which embodies a basic tension in the Aristotelian concept of substance. The first of these phases moves between the two poles of the tension between, on the one hand, the conception of substance as the substratum (hupokeimenon) and, on the other, the conception of substance as the individual thing (tode ti). We shall see in the third section below that this dichotomy corresponds to the two conceptions of substance (dravya) found in Patahijali's Mahabh•sya. The second phase concerns the tension between the concepts of "thisness" and "whatness." In the fourth and final part of this essay we shall see how the tension between "thisness" and "whatness"-or, to be more precise, between being conceived as an individual "this" and being conceived as the intelligible essence of the individual "this"-parallels an ambiguity found in the Indian concept of the "real thing" (vastu), as seen in the philosophy of Kumirila Bhatta.




Two Notions of Substance (Dravya) in Patafijali's Mahabhasya

The first of these ambiguities, that of substance as the substrate (hupokeimenon) or as the individual thing (tode ti), can be found in Patafijali's Mahabhasya (second century B.C.E.), a work that deals with a number of philosophical questions relating to Sanskrit grammar. Among these is the problem of the denotation of words. The underlying assumption of the grammarians was that words refer directly to that aspect of reality sharing in the eternal nature of the words of the Sanskrit language. Thus, the question of the denotation of words becomes that of identifying the aspect of the things of the world that is eternal. Patafijali records and eventually reconciles two earlier views on this topic. The first, which is associated in the grammatical tra- dition with the name Vajapydyana, maintains that words refer primarily to the form (akrti) inhering in things that is responsible for their generic identity.31 The other, associated with the name Vyadi, argues that words refer to the underlying substance (dravya). This first view argues that the form (ak.rti) is permanent (nitya) while the individual substances (dravya~ni) are impermanent.32 The second argues just the re- verse, that it is the underlying substance (dravya) that is permanent and that it is the various forms assumed by this substance that are impermanent.33

There are two points to be made in regard to this debate. The first is to note its structural similarity to Aristotle's investigation into the nature of substance (ousia) outlined above. The second is to recognize that the two sides of this debate talk past each other inasmuch as they presuppose quite distinct conceptions of "substance" or dravya.34

A Structural Similarity Taken a whole, this debate can be regarded as an attempt to specify a vague category with two candidate positions.35 The debate implies a formal definition of the denotation of words (padartha), similar in this respect to that of Aristotle's concept of ousia. Just as the ousia was defined as whatever it is that is most real, the denotation of words refers to whatever aspect of extra-linguistic reality can be shown to be permanent.36 The proponent of the form as this primary meaning, the akrtivadin, argues that the permanent akrti serves as the best candidate for the padartha, while the proponent of the substance, the dravyavadin, argues that the underlying substance or dravya best performs this function.

The translation of both the Greek concept of ousia and the Sanskrit concept of dravya by the same English word "substance" obscures the structural similarity of the two investigations. The ousia, functioning as a vague category in Aristotle's investi-

gation, corresponds not to dravya but to the padacrtha, which, like the ousia, can be

specified by the formal structure (a~krti) as well as by the material substratum. Dravya, or "substance" in the more determinate, everyday sense of the term, merely serves as one of the candidates in the investigation. Unlike the Aristotelian ousia, the con-

cept of dravya has enough in the way of determinate content-conceptual mass, as it were-to prevent it from being carried over into the semantic realm of "form."




The Ambiguity of Dravya Nevertheless, although more determinate than the formal concept of ousia, the notion of dravya possesses a certain degree of conceptual mobility. The argument of the akrtivadin presupposes the concept of the dravya as the individual object that can be created or destroyed. Distinguishable from this perishable object is its generic form (akrti), which, in a sense, survives the destruction of its substratum, just as a jungle vine survives the felling of the tree that once supported it.37

When we turn to the argument used by the dravyavadin to establish the eternal nature of the dravya, we notice that a significant shift has occurred in the understanding of substance. The dravyavadin bases his argument on the analogy of the manufacture of clay artifacts. When a lump of clay is progressively molded into various forms, one form is destroyed as a new one comes to be.38 Meanwhile, the underlying substance of the clay remains.39 Here dravya refers to the underlying material "stuff" of reality, while akrti now comes to refer precisely to those individual composites of form and matter that were called dravya by the akrtivadin.

We can more clearly visualize the relationship between these competing conceptions of the dravya/akrti relation by relating them to Aristotle's illustration of the artisan's construction of a bronze sphere. Aristotle notes that the artisan makes neither the bronze material nor the spherical form. The created product of the artisan's labor is merely the individual thing (tode ti), the instantiation of the form in the particular material.40 This illustration suggests an (admittedly crude, but perhaps helpful) conception of reality in which physical objects represent a region of non- eternality sandwiched between two eternal metaphysical realms. The composite is perishable, but its two metaphysical components, namely matter and form, are not.41 Now the dravya/lkrti relation as understood by the 5krtivddin occupies the upper two-thirds of this sandwich arrangement. The dravya as the individual composite thing belongs to the intermediate region of the perishable, while the akrti, inasmuch as it provides a basis for generic class concepts, indicates a realm of being tran- scending this intermediate region. As understood by the dravyavadin, by contrast, the dravya/lkrti relation covers the bottom two-thirds of this triple-decker conception of reality. The dravya, now understood to be the underlying "stuff" of reality, corresponds to the realm of the imperishable material substratum, while the interchange- able forms of the clay (akrti) correspond to the middle region of the perishable composite of matter and form.

If we focus only on the dravya term of these two relations, we see at once that, for the akrtivddin, dravya is the individual thing (tode ti), while for the dravyavadin it is the substratum (hupokeimenon). Thus, a comparison of these two positions in the Indian debate reveals the same tension as we find in what I called the first stage of Aristotle's investigation into the nature of substance.42

However, although the two sides of the tension are the same, the ways in which Aristotle and Patafijali evaluate them are not. We saw above that Aristotle quickly lost confidence in the subject criterion after he discovered that a reliance on it led to a conception of substance, namely as primary matter, that lacked the characteristic of individuality. At this point the subject criterion buckled, as it were, and the




thisness criterion for substance proclaimed its ascendancy. Thus, Aristotle, while never abandoning completely the understanding of substance as the substratum (hupokeimenon), tended to favor that of substance as the individual (tode ti). Aris- totle's concept of substantial form (eidos) includes as an essential determination the idea of individuality, while it maintains only a tenuous link with the notion of being a substratum.

By contrast, the discussion of substance found in Patatijali evidences a prefer- ence for the conception of substance as the substratum. The dravyavadin, and even, although to a lesser extent, the akrtivadin, associate the notion of individuality with impermanence. The Indian philosophers do not make the distinction Aristotle does between individuality as such and individuality as a characteristic of the perishable composite. One can infer from the •krtivadin's arguments in the Mahabhasya that the akrti is eternal in spite of its individuality; its eternal nature consists of the fact that it, like the vision of the sun or the powers of the god Indra, is present everywhere at once.43

We can shed some light on the curious fact that the conception of substance as the substratum survived-indeed, flourished-in Indian metaphysics, whereas it failed to hold up well in Aristotle's thought, when we note the absence in India of the doctrine of the unknowability of matter. In Vedanta, brahman, as the metaphysical substratum of the world, remains knowable in spite of its subtlety. Like the clay that underlies the various forms it can assume, brahman is regarded as a knowable class (jati), namely the universal being (satta).44 For Aristotle, by contrast, matter, defined in the Physics as the substratum of substantial change, is, as such, unknowable.45 A shapeless material such as clay is knowable insofar as it embodies a form (eidos)-a principle of determination-with respect to its constituent elements. Nevertheless, it remains unknowable as matter.46 Thus, a comparison with Aristotle's concept of matter reveals that the enduring viability of the reality-as-substrate concept in Indian thought can be explained in terms of a principle that was decisive in Aristotle's thought and which will figure prominently in our next comparison, namely the intelligibility criterion for substance.

The Ambiguity between "Thisness" and "Whatness" in the Concept of Vastu

The Sanskrit term vastu, "real thing," "concrete entity," is more often than not used in a non-thematic sense in the philosophical contexts with which I am familiar. In some contexts it is used merely to assert the reality of something-that "this is a something, not a nothing"-where an understanding of what is asserted is simply assumed. Elsewhere, particularly in some Buddhist contexts, it is used to talk about "something" without committing to a particular position on the ontological status of that something.47 The non-thematic uses of the term tend to vary inasmuch as there is no explicit definition against which to register and modulate shifts in meaning. The sense of the term thus tends to be highly dependent on the particular context. Given the flexibility in the meaning of vastu, we might expect its range of meaning to overlap with some of the senses of ousia in Aristotle.




Two main usages of the term vastu are recorded in the philosophical dictionary known as the Nyaya-kosa. According to the Kosa, vastu refers, first of all, to "those

objects agreed upon [by all], such as the pot and the sky, etc."48 Here the term refers to everyday notions of what is real. Monier-Williams echoes this sense of the term when he defines vastu as "any really existing or abiding substance or essence, thing, object, article."49 In this first sense the term appears to parallel closely the "most obvious" understanding of ousia to which Aristotle refers at the outset of his investi-

gation in Metaphysics Z.2. Curiously enough, both terms can refer, in nonphilo- sophical contexts, to goods, wealth, and property.50

The Nyaya-kosa then proceeds to give another definition of vastu that corre-

sponds to the sense of this term in philosophical contexts. This revised philosophical understanding of the term marks a shift away from its everyday meaning. Accord-

ing to this second sense, the vastu is an object of knowledge (prameya) or a self-

subsisting essence (svaropa).51 Here, the concept of the vastu as a self-subsistent

entity52 is distinguished from really existing objects, whose actuality is expressed by their connection with the universal predicate existence (sattasambandha). This later sense of vastu emerged from the Vaisesika doctrine that the universal "existence" (satta) could be predicated of the first three Vaisesika categories: substance, quality, and motion (dravya, guIna, and karma, respectively). This notion of things having a connection with existence raised the difficult-and philosophically somewhat embarrassing-question of the ontological status of the entity serving as one of the terms of the relation.53 'Reality' (vastutva or astitva) "is logically prior to 'existence'."54 Generally, the class of entities (vastoni) is broader than that of actually existing things, the former class encompassing all six categories, including universals.55 Here, vastu refers to any "thing" that can be spoken about or known (prameya)-essentially, anything that can be referred to by a noun. This understanding of vastu, we should add, corresponds to Bhartrhari's concept of conventional or lin- guistically constituted substance (samvyavaharika-dravya). According to Bhartrhari, anything that can be referred to by a pronoun and thus distinguished from other

things can be called a substance.56 The reification implicit in pronominal reference allows even actions and universals to be included in this definition of substance.57

This latter conception of vastu as referring to those "things" we can talk about while leaving open the question of their existence implies a distinction between subsistence and existence. Existence (bhavatva) is predicated to members of the

potentially larger class of subsisting things. What is ultimately responsible for this shift from the vastu as the concrete singular thing to an existentially neutral subsisting nature is the conception of being as a predicate. In other words, the shift occurs thanks to a formal similarity between the predication of specific attributes to a concrete "this," on the one hand, and the predication of existence or nonexistence to a

fully intelligible nature, on the other. The problematic conception of existence as a mere attribute of something results, in turn, from the understanding of being as a type of universal, a notion, incidentally, that Aristotle explicitly rejects.

This shift from the understanding of vastu as a concrete existing thing to a self-

subsisting essence parallels in some respects the progression from Aristotle's early




understanding of ousia as the subject of predication (the concrete individual thing, the tode ti) to that of ousia as the essence (to ti en einai). In both cases the transition represents a progression from a more or less commonsense understanding to one that is theoretically more developed. If we accept the traditional view of the Cate- gories as the first and most basic of the logical works, works that were intended to be propaedeutic to Aristotle's scientific investigations,58 then we can regard the concept of primary substance presented in the Categories as reflecting the commonsense understanding of substance embodied in everyday patterns of speech and thought. The concept of substance as the concrete individual thing reflects the commonsense view that something is real if you can point at it. As we have seen, however, the "scientific" analysis undertaken in the Metaphysics forced a revision of this conception of substance. Substance eventually is identified with the intelligible aspect of things. Unlike the conception of vastu, however, it never comes to denote a merely subsisting essence.

The Senses of Vastu in Kumarila An excellent place to track the shifting senses of the vastu concept is the Sloka- varttika of Kumarila Bhatta, the great eighth-century philosopher of ritual theory (mTmamsa). Here one can detect the above-mentioned tension between the vastu as the subject of predication and as the knowable essence of something. Kumarila, however, never dissociates the concept of vastu from that of being. Thus, one might expect the ambiguity of vastu in Kumarila to parallel closely the tension in Aristotle's conception of substance.

The understanding of vastu as the individual subject of predication is the dominant one. In most usages the meaning of vastu coincides very nearly with that of the individual, vyakti. The vyakti is the concrete, individual thing of which universal class notions (jati, akrti) are predicated.59 However, the concept of the individual (vyakti or vastu) cannot be identified, strictly speaking, with that of the particular (videsa), for the individual thing also embodies the universal (samanya). This is evident from the fact that the individual can occasion the idea of class membership or universality, as, for example, when I recognize a particular animal as belonging to the species "cow." From this observation that the same object alternatively gives rise to the ideas of inclusion with, and exclusion from, others, Kumarila develops his doctrine of the object possessing a double nature (samanyavisesatmakamr vastu).60

A careful reading of the texts will reveal, however, that Kumarila tends to use the term vyakti (or the nearly synonymous pindia) when referring to the individual things-the particulars-of which universals are predicated, and the term vastu to the neutral object embodying both the notions of particularity and universality.61 In other words, he uses vyakti and pinda in the context of what can be regarded as a shorthand version of the relationship between subject and predicate, namely the predication of universals to particulars, whereas he uses the term vastu in the context of the unabridged and more nuanced conception of this relation, which conception recognizes that predication distinguishes as much as it universalizes. We can sur- mise that it is the vagueness of vastu that better suits it for this latter function, as




opposed to vyakti and pincda, both of which are more strongly associated with the notion of particularity. Still, the vastu, despite its neutrality vis-a-vis the concepts of universal and particular, also retains an association with the notion of the sensible particular, although this association between vastu and particularity is not as

strong.62 A shift in the meaning of vastu from the sensible particular to the intelligible

aspect of that particular can be detected in the section of the Slokavarttika where Kumarila argues that negation (abhava) is a means of valid cognition (prama•a).

In this, the Abhavapariccheda, Kumarila declares that the nonexistent object of a ne-

gation is a vastu.63 Prima facie, this rather curious doctrine of the reality (vastutva) of nonbeing suggests a distinction between existence (bhavatva) and subsistence, and the conception of "reality" (vastutva) as the latter. In other words, this doctrine seems to imply the second sense of "vastu" mentioned in the Nyaya-Koda as "self-

subsisting essence." The interpretation of this peculiar notion of the reality of nonbeing, however, is

not nearly so straightforward, nor is it without ambiguity. John Taber, in fact, inter-

prets this doctrine in such a way that "vastu" retains its meaning as the sensible

particular. Appealing to several key verses in the Abhavaparicceda and Parthasd- rathimiira's commentary thereon, Taber argues that, according to Kumarila, the

nonbeing of something is real insofar as it is a property (dharma) of the object that is actually present.64 For example, the fact of not being silver is considered a property of a piece of shell. Inasmuch as a property (dharma) can be considered to be identical with its underlying substrate (dharmin), the property-the fact of not

being silver-can be considered to be just as real as its substrate, the shell.65 Thus, according to Taber's interpretation, the negative judgment derives its reality-its vastutva-from the proximate object. This object is the vastu. So when Kumdrila states that the vastu exists if taken in its own form but does not exist if taken in the form of something else (svaropapararOpabhyam sadasadatmakam vastu),66 this is

interpreted to mean that the proximate object-the shell-can be said not to exist if taken in the form of something else, for example as silver.67

When we consider, however, the definition of vastu as the object of valid cognition (prameyam), another interpretation of this statement suggests itself.68 If the vastu denotes the reality corresponding to the determinate content (pariccheda) of the cognition,69 then the vastu of the negative judgment is not the proximate object (the shell), but rather the object whose existence is denied, namely the silver that is not present. So, taking bhava/sat in the sense of "presence," we can say that the vastu, now the silver, can have the property of either being present (bhava/sat) or

being absent (abhava/asat). Thus, according to this second way of understanding Kumdrila's doctrine of the reality of nonbeing, the negative judgment derives its

reality not from the proximate object but rather from the non-proximate object whose form (ropa) conforms to the determinate content of the judgment.

This second interpretation has the advantage of being more consistent with a central tenet in Kumarila's philosophy, namely the doctrine of intrinsic validity of

cognition (svatah pramanya).70

This doctrine asserts that our cognitions can be




assumed to correspond to reality unless contradicted by subsequent experience. This principle that all of our cognitions, even erroneous ones, can be traced back to real objects was intended to counter Buddhist illusionism.71 Kumarila undercuts the Buddhist contention that dream cognition represents the prototypical instance of our cognitive experience in general by denying the very possibility of objectless cognition.72 Accordingly, he argues that dream images are simply imaginative re- arrangements of real objects experienced previously (if only in the experience of past lives).73 This understanding of dream cognition epitomizes a fundamental principle by which Kumarila reconciles misapprehension in general to the intrinsic-validity doctrine: the identification of the objective basis of a cognition with its determinate content.74 Thus, in the stock example of erroneous cognition, the judgment "this is silver" made in reference to a piece of shell, the objective basis (alambanam = vastu) is the silver object, existing elsewhere, whose nature or form coincides fully with the content of the erroneous cognition.75 Error is simply a matter of the false predication of the idea of presence, derived from the proximate object (the shell), to the cognition of the silver.76 We can see that this understanding of erroneous cognition conforms very closely to the second interpretation of negative cognition mentioned above. In both cases, what guarantees the objectivity or reality (vastutva) of the cognition is the spatially/temporally removed object. The vastu is the known object that can possess the property of presence or absence depending on where one is standing in relation to it.

The two interpretations of Kumarila's doctrine of the reality of nonbeing that we have been considering imply two subtly different conceptions of the vastu. As we have seen, the first implies the understanding of the vastu as the sensibly present particular thing in which various properties inhere, including the very peculiar property of not being something else. According to the second interpretation, the vastu also refers to a real something existing in extra-mental reality-reality (vastutva) is never divorced from the idea of objective existence in Kumarila. The differ- ence is that here the vastu responsible for the objectivity of the knowledge of the absence of silver (or of the misapprehension of shell for silver) is any silver object, not this silver object.77 All that matters is that there exist silver objects somewhere or sometime. This second conception of the vastu thus implies an abstraction of the content of knowledge from a particular instantiation (if only in the sense of an implicit awareness of the contingency of a particular instantiation). Understood as the remote object, the knowledge of which is mediated through the memory, not the senses, the vastu is fully transparent to the intellect. The vastu in this second sense is the object of knowledge (prameya), not the thing about which one has knowledge.

These two senses of the vastu concept roughly correspond, respectively, to Aristotle's conception of substance as the subject of predication in the Categories and that of substance as the essence or form in the Metaphysics. In both cases, we see an evolution in the conception of reality in the direction of intelligibility. Like Aristotle's concept of primary substance, the first and basic conception of the vastu as the bearer of properties (dharmin) is not completely known inasmuch as the subject is not exhausted by its knowable predicates. We have noted, however, dis-




cussions that suggest a tendency of this primary conception of the vastu to meta-

morphose into one in which the vastu is identical with the knowable aspect of

things. Thus, we detect a shift-very likely unconscious due to the nonthematic nature of the vastu concept-that mirrors the conscious evolution of Aristotle's con-

ception of substance. This parallel with the shifting meaning of vastu suggests that the evolution in Aristotle's thinking on substance reflects what is very likely a natural and perhaps inevitable process.

An examination of the respective historical factors that were responsible for pushing both Aristotle's and Kumarila's understanding of reality in the direction of intelligibility reveals that essentially the same basic philosophical issue underlies their re-

spective conceptions of substance. This is the need to reconcile the changeability of the sensible world with the demand that there be something in extra-mental reality corresponding to the stability of the words of language. That this issue ultimately underlies Aristotle's investigation into the nature of substance becomes clear when we recognize the influence of Plato on Aristotle's eventual identification of substance with the knowable aspect of things. As mentioned above, the emergence of the intelligibility criterion for substance in the Metaphysics represents a return of sorts to his Platonic heritage.7 Now Plato's doctrine of the forms, as Aristotle himself informs us, ultimately can be traced back to the early influence of the Heraclitean doctrine of universal flux.79 Forced to reconcile this basic characterization of the sensible world with the demand for scientific knowledge, Plato posited a realm of ideal entities possessing the stability presupposed by scientific definition. Notwith-

standing the significant differences that remain between Plato's metaphysics and Aristotle's, the latter's decision to locate substance in the definable species rather than the transient individuals represents a solution to the same basic problem.

Inasmuch as Kumarila's doctrine of intrinsic validity represents a rejection of Buddhist illusionism, the conception of the vastu as the object of knowledge reflects a similar effort to reconcile the validity of knowledge with the changeability of the sensible world. The similarity between the Buddhist doctrine of instantaneous being (ksanika-vada) and the views of Heracleitus is well known. According to this doctrine, there is nothing in an ever-changing reality corresponding to the enduring structures of language and thought. Kumarila's insistence on the coincidence of cognitive content and objective reality thus represents a bold rejoinder to this Buddhist claim. Thus, we see that underlying the inclination to identify the real with the knowable that we have noted in both Aristotle and Kumdrila is the same basic presupposition we noted with respect to PataFijali, namely the demand that there be something in

reality corresponding to the stability, and indeed the eternality, of language.

Notes

Sincere thanks to Max J. Latona for his insightful critical comments on an earlier draft of this essay.




1 - A detailed discussion of Neville's theory can be found in Robert Cummings Neville, ed., Ultimate Realities, Comparative Religious Ideas Project (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2001), chap. 8. See also Neville, The Human Condition, from the same series (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2001), pp. 12-20, as well as Neville's Normative Cultures (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1994), pp. 62-68.

2 - Neville, The Human Condition, p. 14.

3 - Although they might have a provenance in a particular culture or worldview, they are corrected and refined by scholars in the actual process of comparison, until, ideally, any residue of their original provenance-and with it any bias- is reduced to the vanishing point. See Neville, Ultimate Realities, pp. 206-208.

4 - Metaphysics Z. 1.102 8b3-4.

5 - J. H. Lesher, "Aristotle on Form, Substance and Universals: A Dilemma," Phronesis 16 (1971): 1 77.

6 - Metaphysics Z.2.1028b8.

7 - To be precise, these things are only potentially substances, depending for their substantiality on the larger whole of which they are a part. See Metaphysics 7.1 6.1040b5-6, 8.

8 - The essence and the substrate will both be included in Aristotle's conception of substance. Aristotle's consideration of the universal refers implicitly to the philosophy of Plato. In Metaphysics Z.13, Aristotle rejects the candidacy of the universal. The arguments there against the universal would appear to apply equally to the genus, but Aristotle, perhaps mindful of the understanding of the genus as a secondary substance advanced in the Categories, neglects to com- ment on the status of the candidacy of the genus here in the Metaphysics.

9 - The analysis of the Central Books in terms of the four criteria for substance comes from Professor John J. Cleary's presentation in his course "Beyond Aris- totle's Physics" (Philosophy 774), held at Boston College in the Fall Semester, 1999. Of course, the responsibility for any misunderstandings or oversights in the following interpretation is mine alone.

10 - Categories 5.2a12, in J. L. Ackrill, trans., Aristotle's Categories and De intepre- tatione (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1963), p. 7.

11 - Categories 1.1 a24: "By 'in a subject' I mean what is in something, not as a part, and cannot exist separately from what it is in" (Ackrill, Aristotle's Categories).

12 - Categories 5.3b10: H-^c~c 8E oioia 8OKEL To6E T~i oT-C(iVE1V.

13 - In the Categories, Aristotle relegates the two concepts expressive of "whatness," namely the species (ela0s) and the genus, to the rank of secondary substance (2a13-15), indicating that there what I have called the intelligibility criterion is secondary. The species reveals the primary substance (2b31), but




the primary substance, insofar as it is an individual thing, is not fully intelligible. There is no definition of the individual qua individual, for the individuals of the same species are distinguished only by their accidents, and the accidents do not enter into the definition. See Joseph Moreau, "L'etre et I'essence dans la philosophie d'Aristote," in Autour d'Aristote: Recueil d'etudes de philosophie ancienne et m6di6vale offert a Monseigneur A. Mansion (Louvain: Publications Universitaires de Louvain, 1955), pp. 191-192.

14 - The requirement that what is real in a thing corresponds to the definition

explains Aristotle's decision to locate the ousia in the species rather than in the individuals of that species. It is only the species, strictly speaking, that is definable. See Moreau, "L'etre et I'essence," p. 191.

15 - Metaphysics Z.1.1028a14-15. See also Metaphysics A.7.1017a25.

16 - Joseph Owens, "Matter and Predication in Aristotle," in Aristotle: A Collec- tion of Critical Essays, ed. J.M.E. Moravicsik (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1968), pp. 193-194.

17 - Aristotle's project in the Central Books of the Metaphysics can be regarded as an attempt to revise his understanding of substance to accommodate the

theory of form-matter composition (Russell Dancy, "On Some of Aristotle's First

Thoughts on Substance," Philosophical Review 84 [1974]: 338-339).

18 - Metaphysics Z.3.1029a9: [O0~cia ari] -T 7

1p Kic/' J1TOKEEl'VOU V& AA Kcay' 0 -rOT

19 - Metaphysics Z.3.1029al 3.

20 - Prime matter (versus matter worked up with some form) is pure potency for Aristotle. As such, it is potentially many things, but is nothing actually. As

actually nothing, it simply cannot be identified with what is most real. For a nice overview of the controversial issue of prime matter in Aristotle, see Shel- don Cohen, Aristotle on Nature and Incomplete Substance (Cambridge: Cam-

bridge University Press, 1996), pp. 55 ff.

21 - Metaphysics Z.3.1029a21.

22 - Metaphysics Z.3.1029a26-7: "If we hold this view, it follows that matter is substance. But this is impossible; for it is accepted that separability and in-

dividuality belong especially to substance" (Metaphysics, Books I-IX, trans.

Hugh Tredennick, Loeb Classical Library, no. 271 [Cambridge, MA: Harvard

University Press, 1933], p. 319).

23 - Metaphysics Z.3.1029a29-35.

24 - See, for example, the parenthetical remark in Metaphysics Z.10.1035b34.

25 - Joseph Owens, The Doctrine of Being in the Aristotelian Metaphysics (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1951), pp. 345, 365.




26 - Aristotle, of course, rejects the Platonic view that the form is a universal, that when we understand forms we do not understand the sensible particulars per se, but ideal essences. In 1031b19-20, Aristotle says that the individual thing and its essence (-r6 Ti iv Tvc t) are one and the same. This leaves open, however, the question of how the form, which Aristotle identifies with the essence of an individual thing, can make something into an individual "this something" (T685E T) without itself having individual qualities.

27 - This is the last of the various puzzles mentioned in Metaphysics B; see Meta- physics B.6.1003a8-15.

28 - Moreau, "L'etre et I'essence," p. 193.

29 - Ibid., pp. 191-192.

30 - Ibid., p. 198.

31 - Wilhelm Halbfass, On Being and What There Is (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1992), p. 91.

32 - Patadjali, The Vyakarana-Mahabhasya, ed. F. Kielhorn, 3rd ed., rev. by K. V. Abhyankar (Poona: Deccan College Postgraduate and Research Institute, 1962-1972), vol. 1, p. 7, 1.9:

ak.rtirhi nitya dravyamanityam. 33 - Mahabhjsya, vol. 1, p. 7, 11.11-12: dravyam hi nityam akrtiranitya. 34 - And, correlatively, different conceptions of akrti. See note 38 below.

35 - The context in which this debate about the nature of the padartha occurs is exegetical. Pataijali's primary concern is the proper construal of Katyayana's varttika "siddhe 'abdarthasambandhe,'" where siddha, "established," is taken to mean nitya, "eternal." If the compound is taken as a dvandva, so that all three terms-namely the word, meaning, and the connection between word and meaning-are governed by the adjective "siddha," then the meaning of the word (padartha), whether it be the akrti or the dravya, must be eternal.

36 - In Indian thought there was, as in Greece, an association of being with per- manence. The notion that the "really real" stands apart from the vicissitudes of time is certainly true of the Vedantic concept of brahman. Yet the identity of the real with the permanent was neither absolute nor universally held. In the Vaisesika system, for example, the derivative, non-eternal (anitya) substances were not necessarily less real than the eternal substances from which they were derived. See Halbfass, On Being and What There Is, p. 94.

37 - Mahabhhsya, vol. 1, p. 247, 11.6, 9-10: "The form is not destroyed [even] when the substance is.... This is similar to the way in which the jungle vine, which is supported by the tree, is not destroyed even when the tree is chopped down" (dravyavinaie ak.rteravinaah. .... tadyatha vrksastho 'vatano vrkse cchinne 'pi na vinalyati). Understanding the precise nature of the akrtivadin's concept of ak.rti is tricky. On the one hand, at the time of the Mahabhasya the term referred to the shape or configuration of something and, as such, was distin-




guished from the class (j5ti) or universal (samanya). On the other hand, the discussion in the Mahabhasya implies a conception of akrti as a generic form, inasmuch as it refers to that element in things that can be recognized in others belonging to the same class. For an excellent discussion of the meaning of akrti, see M. Biardeau, Th6orie de la connaissance et philosophie de la parole dans le brahmanisme classique (Paris: Mouton and Co., 1964), pp. 46 ff.

38 - Mahabh~sya, vol. 1, p. 7, 11.12-14.

39 - Mahabhasya, vol. 1, p. 7, 11.17-18: "The shape becomes different each time, but the substance remains exactly the same. With the destruction of a shape, the substance alone remains" (akrtir anya canya ca bhavati dravyam punas- tadeva. akrtyupamardena dravyam evava`isyate).

40 - Metaphysics Z.7.1033a24-1033b1 4.

41 - Matter, understood as the substratum of substantial change (see Physics A.7), is a metaphysical principle. It is not directly perceptible (see De generatione 2.319b15 ff.) and can be established only by analogy with the substratum of accidental change (see Physics A.7.191a8-11). Aristotelian form, of course, inasmuch as it has existence only in things, has permanent existence only insofar as its material instantiations always exist. The same could be said for the akrti.

42 - As noted by Halbfass, On Being and What There Is, p. 91.

43 - Mahabhasya, vol. 1, p. 247, 11.1, 3-4. See also Biardeau, Th6orie de la connaissance et philosophie, pp. 53-54.

44 - See, for example, Marndana Migra's Brahmasiddhi, ed. S. Kuppuswami Sastri (Delhi: Sri Satguru Publications, 1984), p. 98, 11.12-13: "The idea of person who recognizes that the (jug) is of the same genus as the (dish) is the same as that which arises with respect to different existents"

(vim.rsatastu tajjatTyam idam iti buddhih, sadantare 'pi samana).

45 - For example, Metaphysics Z.10.1036a9.

46 - Dancy, "Aristotle's Second Thoughts on Substance," pp. 407-408.

47 - For Madhyamika Buddhists, the addition of the suffix matra to vastu ("only a thing," "a mere thing") expresses the view that whatever is referred to as a vastu has validity only in a conventional and not in an ultimate sense. See Malcolm David Eckel, Jihanagarbha's Commentary on the Distinction between the Two Truths (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1987), pp. 39, 75.

48 - Mahamahopadhyaya BhTmacarya Jhalakikar, ed., Nyayakosa, 4th ed. (Pune: Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, 1978), p. 728: vastu-samketavisayah, yatha ghatagaganadi.

49 - Monier Monier-Williams, A Sanskrit-English Dictionary (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995), p. 932.




50 - Ibid., p. 932; Liddell and Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968), p. 1274.

51 - "To be a vastu is to be an object of valid cognition. Or else [being a vastu] denotes a particular kind of relation [of something] with its own nature [i.e., being what it is as such]" (vastutvarn ca prameyatvam svarupasamnbandha- viseso va).

52 - The word "entity," by virtue of its vagueness, seems to be an appropriate translation of vastu in this context. As Joseph Owens notes, "['entity'] is a neutral word, entirely non-committal" (Owens, The Doctrine of Being, p. 149).

53 - See Halbfass, On Being and What There Is, chap. 8, for a thorough discussion of the philosophical problems raised by the Vaisesika sattasambandha doctrine in the history of classical Indian philosophy.

54 - Raja Ram Dravid, The Problem of Universals in Indian Philosophy (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 2001), p. 34. Dravid is referring here specifically to the concept of astitva, but what he says about it here can also apply to vastutva, inasmuch as the two concepts coincide.

55 - See Halbfass' response to K. Harikai concerning this issue in E. Franco and K. Preisendanz, eds., Beyond Orientalism: The Work of Wilhelm Halbfass and Its Impact on Indian and Cross-Cultural Studies (Amsterdam and Atlanta: Rodopi, 1997), p. 483. Kumarila refers to the notion of a universal of universals (the genuineness of which he himself rejects) in Slokavarttika, Akrtivada, 21cd; his commentator Parthasarathi Migra expresses this notion of a meta-universal more fully: "There is a universal with respect to universals which is called 'vastutva"' (astyeva samanyesvapi vastutvam nama samanyam).

56 - See VWkyapadTya 111.4.3: "That in reference to which a pronoun is used is substance, presented as something to be differentiated" (K. A. Subramania lyer, trans., The VikyapadTya of Bhartrhari [Poona: Deccan College Postgraduate and Research Institute, 1971], p. 123). (vastupalaksanam yatra sarvanama prayujyate dravyamityucyate so 'rtho bhedyatvena vivaksitah-note the vague, nonthematic use of "vastu" in this verse.) See also B. K. Matilal, Epistemology, Logic, and Grammar in Indian Philosophical Analysis (The Hague: Mouton, 1971), pp. 109-113; also K. A. Subramania lyer, Bhartrhari: A Study of the VWkyapadTya in Light of the Ancient Commentaries (Poona: Deccan College Postgraduate and Research Institute, 1969), pp. 78-79, 262-263.

57 - See Helaraja's commentary on VWkyapadTya 111.4.3: "Thus, even a universal, when presented as something to be qualified, becomes substance" (lyer, The

VWkyapadTya of Bhartrhari). (tatha ca jatyadirapi videsyatvena ced vivaksitas- tada~ dravyamiti.) See also Matilal, Epistemology, Logic, and Grammar, pp. 111-112.

58 - Joseph Owens, "Matter and Predication in Aristotle," p. 194.




59 - The MTmamsa-Slokavarttika of Kumbrila Bhatta, with the commentary called Nyayaratnakara by Parthasarathi Misra, ed. Rama Sastri Tailanga (Benares: Chowkhamba Sanskrit Series, 1898-1899) (hereafter cited as SV), Akrtivada, 3ab: "The class itself has been called "akrti," [for] it is by means of it that the individual is determined (akriyate)" (jatimevakrtimr prahurvyaktirakriyate yaya).

60 - SV, Akrti, 5: "With respect to all objects there arises an idea at once conveying a sense of that object's inclusion with, and exclusion from, other objects. And such an idea would not be possible unless the object itself possessed a double nature" (saravastusu buddhisca

vyav.rttyanugamatmika jayate, dvyatmatvena vina sa ca na siddhyati). Cf.

SV, Abhava, 9abc.

61 - Cf., for example, Abhava 9, Akrti 5, Akrti 59-60, and Pratyaksa 118-texts in which Kumarila uses the term vastu-to Akrti 3, Akrti 46, Vanavada 3, and Vanavada 75-76-texts in which he uses vyakti or pinda.

62 - Cf. Akrti 60ab to Akrti 62ab, where Kumarila expresses the idea of the object (vastu) appearing either in its individual form (60ab) or in its universal form (62ab). Note that the word vastu appears only in the first of these verses (tad5 visesamatrena vastu pratyavabhasate) and is only implied in the second (tada samanyamitratvamevameva pratlyate). That Kumarila chose not to place the term vastu in apposition with samanyamatram suggests an awareness of some tension between his conception of the vastu and everyday associations of the term with the individual.

63 - SV Abhavaparicchedah, 8b: tenasya [abhivasya] vastutO. Cf. Abhava, 9abc.

64 - John Taber, "Much Ado about Nothing: Kumarila, Santaraksita, and Dharma- kTrti on the Cognition of Non-Being," Journal of the American Oriental Society 121 (1) (2001): 72, 75, 77. Taber's interpretation has good textual support and is, accordingly, essentially sound. Thus, in defending an alternative interpretation below I am simply suggesting that the Slokavjrttika implies an understanding of the vastu concept that is not entirely consistent. In keeping with this basic thesis, I am inclined to take the understanding of negation as a property-upon which understanding Taber bases his interpretation-in a more figurative sense. The conception of negation and affirmation as properties inhering in a single substrate but accessible to different pramanas clearly is an analogy based on the experienced fact of the inherence of the sensible properties of smell and color (which are accessible to different organs of sense) in, say, a single piece of fruit.

65 - Taber, "Much Ado about Nothing," p. 77. See Parthasarathi's commentary on Abhava, 8ab, where the fact of not being curds is considered a real property of milk: "The non-being of the curds is the milk by virtue of the fact that it is a property of [the milk], for the property and the property-bearer are not abso- lutely different from each other" (ksTrameva dadhyabhavah, taddharmatvad, dharmadharmino? canatibheda~t).




66 - SV, Abhava, 12; see also Parthasarathi's commentary on Abh~va, 20ab: eka- meva bhavabhhvatmakam vastviti.

67 - Taber, "Much Ado about Nothing," pp. 75-76.

68 - See SV, Abhava, 9cd: "Therefore (since different forms of negation can be

both distinguished from, and grouped with, each other), negation must be an object like a cow. And also because it is an object of valid cognition" (tasmad [abhavah] gavadivad vastu, prameyatvac ca gamyate).

69 - See SV,

Abhava 47, where Kumarila says that it is determination (pariccheda), not presence (bhava), that is essential to valid cognition: "It is not established by royal decree that [only] existing objects can be objects of knowledge. For both negation and affirmation are valid means of cognition by virtue of the fact that both produce determinate cognitions [of their respective objects]" (bhavatmakasya manatvam na ca rajajihaya sthitam, paricchedaphalatvad dhi pram~nyam syad dvayorapi). This verse suggests that it is not the sensible presence of the proximate object, but rather the quidditative determination derived from the non-proximate object(s) that is responsible for the reality of the negative judgment.

70 - Taber himself points out that Kumarila's doctrine of intrinsic validity supports that of the reality of negation ("Much Ado about Nothing," pp. 76-77). Yet the interpretation of the reality of negation (or error) as deriving from the proximate object, inasmuch as it implies a gap between the content of the cognition and its objective basis, fails to realize fully the demands of the intrinsic-validity doctrine. To the extent that there is a noncoincidence between cognitive content and objective basis, there remains an element in the cognition lacking objectivity. See Lambert Schmithausen, "Mandianamigra's Vibhramaviveka mit einer Studie zur Entwicklung der indischen Irrtumslehre," Osterreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-Historische Klasse, Sitzung- berichte 247, Band 1, Abhandlung. (Vienna: Hermann B6hlaus, 1965), pp. 171-172, 222.

71 - Taber, "Much Ado about Nothing," p. 77.

72 - Schmithausen, "Mandanamisra's Vibhramaviveka," p. 201.

73 - SV, Niralambanavada, 107cd-109ab, 107cd-108ab: "[Even] in dream cognition an objective basis is not altogether lacking. In every case [of erroneous cognition] there is an objective basis, whose nature is to exist at another place or time" (svapnadipratyaye b~hyam sarvatha na hi nesyate, sarvatralambanam bahyam delaka~la~nyatha~tmakam).

74 - Schmithausen, "Mardanamigra's Vibhramaviveka," p. 201.

75 - Ibid., pp. 203-204; Taber interprets Kumarila's theory of error differently, main-

taining that the objective basis (6lambanam) is the proximate object ("Much Ado about Nothing," p. 77). I suspect that his interpretation is largely based




on Parthasarathi's commentary on Niralambana 117cd-118: tenabhavajia- nasyapi 4uktikadibhavantaram bahyamevalambanamiti. Niralambana 11 7cd- 118 itself, however, is obscure, perhaps even ambiguous. See Mandana Migra, Brahmasiddhi, 147:1-2, where Mandana criticizes Kumarila's theory on the grounds that it does not posit the proximate object as the objective substratum: "In [the Prabhakaras' negative] definition of error as non-appre- hension, the notion that objectivity pertains to the object in contact with the

eyes is not needed. Nor does the other one [Kumarila] posit this notion [in his

explanation] for erroneous cognition" (athagrahene naiva caksuhsamryuk- tasyalambanatvam isyate, paro 'pi naiva paryaya icchati). A citation of Nird- lambana 11 7cd-118ab immediately follows.

76 - The influence of the intrinsic-validity doctrine on Kumarila's theory of error can be clearly seen if his theory is compared to Mandana's. Both thinkers upheld the anyathakhyati doctrine of error, that is, the notion that error is a cognition of a real object "otherwise" than it really is. In other words, both maintained that error was simply a matter of assigning a false predicate to a real object. Yet while Mandana interprets the misapprehension of shell for silver to mean the false predication of "silverness" to the proximate object (samnihitasya rajatam), Kumarila understands this misapprehension to be the false predication of

proximity to the silver (rajatasya samrnnihitatam). See Mandana Mifra's Brahma- siddhi, p. 143, 11.4-5.

77 - See Schmithausen, "Mandanamigra's Vibhramaviveka," p. 202.

78 - See Hugh Tredennick's remark in the Introduction to his translation of the

Metaphysics in the Loeb series: "Aristotle's thought is always struggling against Platonic influences, which nevertheless generally emerge triumphant in his ultimate conclusions" (Metaphysics, Books I-IX, p. xxx).

79 - Metaphysics A.6.987a32-35.




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