Verse 3118

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation by Ganganath Jha:

जगत्सदेदृशं चेति न प्रमाणमिहापि वः ।
न युक्ताऽदृष्टिमात्रेण संवर्त्तस्यापि नास्तिता ॥ ३११८ ॥

jagatsadedṛśaṃ ceti na pramāṇamihāpi vaḥ |
na yuktā'dṛṣṭimātreṇa saṃvarttasyāpi nāstitā || 3118 ||

You have no proof for the notion that the world has always been as it is now. The existence of the ‘saṃvarta’ (dissolution) also cannot be denied simply because it is not seen.—(3118)

 

Kamalaśīla’s commentary (tattvasaṃgrahapañjikā):

It has been asserted (by Kumārila) under Texts 2275 and 3114 that—“the world has never been known to be unlike what it is now and that no Universal Dissolution can be admitted”.

The answer to this is as follows:—[see verse 3118 above]

There is no evidence in support of the idea that the World has always been as it is now.

The Buddhists speak of the ‘Saṃvarta’ as the dissolution of all things;—the Smṛti-writers also have declared that—‘This world was a mass of darkness, unknown and undiscernible, unthinkable, unknowable, as if asleep all round,’ (Manu, Chapter I);—where we have the mention of two kinds of ‘Saṃvarta’, ‘Dissolution’; and there is no proof to the effect that there is no such Dissolution,—on the strength of which the world could always remain as it is now.—Merely because a certain thing is not seen, it does not follow that it does not exist; because it often happens that a thing, even though existent, is not seen; specially as it is not known that there is invariable concomitance between ‘non-existence’ and ‘non-perception’.—(3118)