The doctrine of Syadvada holds that since the most contrary characteristics of infinite variety may be associated with a thing, affirmation made from whatever standpoint (naya) cannot be regarded as absolute.  All affirmations are true (in some syadasti or “may be it is” sense); all affirmations are false in some sense; all affirmations are indefinite or inconceivable in some sense (syadavaktavya); all affirmations are true as well as false in some sense (syadasti syannasti); all affirmations are true as well as indefinite (syadasti cavaktavyas’ca); all affirmations are false as well as indefinite; all affirmations are true and false and indefinite in some sense (syadasti syannasti syadavaktavyas’ca).  Thus we may say “the jug is” or the jug has being, but it is more correct to say explicitly that “may be (syat) that the jug is,” otherwise if “being” here is taken absolutely of any and every kind of being, it might also mean that there is a lump of clay or a pillar, or a cloth or any other thing.  The existence here is limited and defined by the form of the jug.  “The jug is” does not mean absolute existence but a limited kind of existence as determined by the form of the jug, “The jug is” thus means that a limited kind of existence, namely the jug-existence is affirmed and not existence in general in the absolute or unlimited sense, for then the sentence “the jug is” might as well mean “the clay is,” “the tree is,” “the cloth is,” etc.  Again the existence of the jug is determined by the negation of all other things in the world; each quality or characteristic (such as red colour) of the jug is apprehended and defined by the negation of all the infinite varieties (such as black, blue, golden), etc., of its class, and it is by the combined negation of all

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[Footnote 1:  See Vis’e@savas’yaka bha@sya, pp. 895, etc., and Syadvadamanjari, pp. 170, etc.]

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the infinite number of characteristics or qualities other than those constituting the jug that a jug may be apprehended or defined.  What we call the being of the jug is thus the non-being of all the rest except itself.  Thus though looked at from one point of view the judgment “the jug is” may mean affirmation of being, looked at from another point of view it means an affirmation of non-being (of all other objects).  Thus of the judgment “the jug is” one may say, may be it is an affirmation of being (syadasti), may be it is a negation of being (syannasti); or I may proceed in quite another way and say that “the jug is” means “this jug is here,” which naturally indicates that “this jug is not there” and thus the judgment “the jug is” (i.e. is here) also means that “the jug is not there,” and so we see that the affirmation of the being of the jug is true only of this place and false of another,