Harmless Soul

SR No.: 001196
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: W J Johnson, Dayanand Bhargav
Publisher: Motilal Banarasidas
Publication Year: 1995
Total Pages: 372
Language: English
Classification: Book_English, Philosophy, & Principle
File Size: 20 MB

Page 274

260 Harmless Souls bhāvas, that it is not bound, and that it is only necessary to realise the truth of that (non-) relation of the self and karma (the not-self) in order to achieve liberation? Apart from the obvious answer, that he is writing a commentary on a received text and so has to make sense of the contents as he finds them (and he is probably working on the assumption that, despite the disparate nature of the gāthās, he is dealing with a work by the revered ācārya Kundakunda), there is another, more compelling reason. Put simply, because the material covered by the first vyavahāra-niścaya pattern comprises the whole socio-ethical content of Jainism, it is essential for the survival and cohesion of the Jaina community to maintain a connection between that content and the soteriological goal. (I shall return to this below.)
7.4 Dvikriyāvāda
Despite the apparent impossibility of resolving it in orthodox terms, Jaina thinkers were periodically forced to confront directly the problem outlined above - namely, what can be the relation between an immaterial conscious self and material unconscious matter, and how can the latter bind or have contact with the former? One of their strategies for dealing with this involves rejection of the dokiriyāvāda / dvi-kriyāvāda doctrine, the assertion that one cause can produce two different effects in this case, the idea that the soul can be the agent of its bhāvas and also of pudgalakarma or karmic modification). An examination of the way dvikriyāvāda is dealt with in the Samayasāra thus helps to clarify the difference between the two vyavahāraniścaya patterns given above.
Samayasāra 83-86 [=89-92] reads:
From the niscaya view the ātman acts on itself alone. And again know that the ātman experiences itself alone [83]. From the vyavahāra view the ātman acts on various kinds of pudgalakarma. Likewise, it experiences [the fruits of] the various kinds of pudgalakarma (84).