Date of Udhayana

[birgit kellner]

nanda chandran wrote:

> If you can show that JnAnashrimitra wrote against theism and also
> show that Udhayana was responding to him, your argument would be more
> convincing.

If I could show that, I would not have written that I don't know it.
Unfortunately, my time is limited, and I don't have the five minutes it would
require to do a thorough comparative study of Udayana's NKus and JJAnazrI's
IzvaravAda :-) No one else has done that yet either, but if one is seriously
looking at debates about theism in this time, it is *essential* to examine these
treatises before jumping to hasty conclusions with far-reaching consequences.
Since *you* are actually advancing a thesis here, this would be your task, not
mine.

It is also worth noting in this context that there were quite a few other
NaiyAyikas that advanced arguments in favour of theism, some of whom are
expressly dealt with by JJAnazrI (Kano Kyo has published partial Japanese
translations of the "pUrvapakSa"-portion of J's IzvaravAda, so this much
information is available) - Vittoka, ZaGkarasvAmin, Trilocana, VAcaspatimizra. I
suppose that, given your line of argument, you would want to date *them*
pre-ZaGkara, too, no?

> As I said before, I find it strange that the top logician of the NyAya
> school would write on a subject which was not critical at that point in
> time.

As I said before, the assumption that the problem was not critical at the point
in time is extremely problematic. This point must be addressed and acknowledged
if one is to come to acceptable conclusions on this matter. I will not repeat
this again, for I am getting tired of debating with people who apparently do not
examine available evidence, yet keep repeating claims for which they would need
much more evidence than they have so far produced.

> All this is quite unnecessary - can we practice some objectivity here? I
> just raised a few questions. Since you are familiar with Udhayana, all you've
> to do is, just show that a post-Shankaran Buddhist philospher raised arguments
> against theism and this is what Udhayana responded to. Then the subject is
> closed.

*I* don't have to do anything; *you* have to provide evidence, by which I mean
solid textual work, a) for why the questions you raised are actually worth
investigating and b) for why the claims you advance are reasonable. I can point
you to several publications that might assist you in this query, but that's all
I can do. You're threading on ground that research has not yet sufficiently
covered, so either you do research yourself, or you revise your claims in order
to factor in the uncertainty regarding whether or not Udayana reacted to
JJAnazrI in NKus. Unless you do one of these things, I agree that "all this is
quite unnecessary", and unless you have any further *specific* evidence to come
up with, I for my part consider this thread closed.

Birgit Kellner
Institute for Tibetan and Buddhist Studies
Vienna University