1 - Mahajana.net

INTRODUCTION 2 7blems. The Buddhist doctrine then came to graft itself on the earlypre-Buddistic stock. But then a clash supervened at once between twoutterly incompatible outlooks. The brahmanical logic was formal andbuilt up on a foundation of naive realism. The Buddhists at that timebecame critical idealists and their interest in logic was not formal, butphilosophic, i. e. f epistemological. A reform of logic became indispensable.It was achieved by Dignaga.§ 7. BUDDHIST LOGIC BEFORE DIGNAGA. 1The fundamental treatise of the Nyaya school, the aphorismscomposed by Go tarn a, contains, loosely mixed up together, rulesof conducting disputations and a manual of logic. Its logical part,the part devoted to inference and syllogism, is comparatively insignificant.The system of realistic ontology was contained in the aphorismsof the sister school of the Vaisesikas. The major part of the firsttreatise is occupied by describing the different methods of carryingon a public debate. The bona fide 2 and mala fide 3 argument aredescribed, the cavilling, 4 the futile answers, 6 logical fallacies 6 andfinally all the cases are mentioned where the debater must be pronouncedby the umpire to have lost the contest. 7 It is only in thereformed new brahmanical logic, the logic which emerged from thestruggle with Buddhism, that this part is dropped altogether andthe theory of syllogism begins to play the central part.The date of origin of the Nyaya-aphorisms is not known withanything like precision. 8 In its systematic form the Nyaya system is1 Cp. on this subject the excellent article of Prof. J. Tucci, JBAS. July 1929,p. 451 ff. It is full of information regarding the logical parts of Asanga's and otherworks. His information on the contents of the Tarka-sastra fragments howeverdoes not agree with the information collected byA.Vostrikov and B. Vassiliev.2 vdda.3 chdla.4 vitanda.5 jati.6 hetr-abhasa.7 nigraha-sthana.8 On the pre-history of the Nyaya system cp. H. Jacobi, Zur Friihgeschichteder ind. Phil. (Preuss. Ak., 1911) and S. C. Vidyabhu§ana, History of IndianLogic, pp. 1—50. On the probable ilate of the Nyaya-sutras of Gotama-Aksapadacp. H. Jacobi JAOS, 1911, p. 29, H. Hi, The Vaisesika Philosophy, p. 16 (HAS),L. Suali, Filosofia Indiana, p. 14, W. Ruben, Die Nyaya-sutras, p. XII,S. N. Dasgupta, History, v. I, p. 277 ff. and my Erkenntnisstheorie u. Logik,Anhang II (Munchen, 1924).