Vada in Theory and Practice: Studies in Debates, Dialogues and Discussions in Indian Intellectual Discourses c7.s4.2

c7.s4.2

The orthodox Naiyāyikas gave the concept of *pañcāvayava-vākya* — the sentence stating the five steps of inference, as elaborated earlier. Both Diṅnāga and Dharmakīrti rejected the concept of *pañcāvayava-vākya*. They emphatically stated that without using the five-member syllogism a *vādī* can prove *sādhya* and all the argument should invariably lead to it and not to any other attribute. For drawing an inference, *pakṣa* and *dṛṣṭānta* these two premises only are sufficient and they make *vyāpti* (invariable concomitance). *Pratijñā* (statement of proposition) and *nigamana* (conclusion) are redundant.⁶⁶ Having rejected the structure of *pañcāvayava-* *vākya*, he also demolishes the sequential order of the five categories there, proposing to abolish the restriction that the probans should be stated first and the instance in the last. He finds any such sequence absurd, because argument can be employed both ways and the aim of causing authentic cognition should be realized, rather than maintenance of an order in the statement of categories.⁶⁷ He also holds the use of two *vyāptis* (*anvaya* and *vyatireka* — the positive concomitance and the negative concomitance) as redundant, because one of them naturally implies the other.⁶⁸