Page Text
________________
Early Jainism 37 that emotion stands as the main obstacle to salvation.101 Jainism is exemplary in that respect. For any system which seeks to regulate physical action to the extent that early Jainism does must also seek to regulate passion or emotion. The two are so closely related as to be virtually interdependent: emotion expresses itself in physical indiscipline, physical indiscipline implies some loss of inner control, whether it be full-blown passion or mere carelessness. Physical and emotional control is therefore paramount. (Again it should be noted that, in terms of karma and avoiding it, it is the physical which takes priority here: one is seeking to control the emotions in order to avoid harmful, and thus karmically binding, actions.)
For the Jaina ascetic, the distinguishing characteristic of the householder's life, with its possessions and the emotions aroused by having and wanting possessions (parigraha and lobha), is lack of control. And as we have seen, according to the Dasaveyāliya Sutta, lobha ('greed') comes to subsume all those emotions which are virtually synonymous with lack of control. This interdependence of 'possessions' (being a householder) and 'possessiveness' (thinking and acting like a householder) are seen as the himsa-causing and thus binding factors par excellence. In this respect, an inadequate monk can all too easily behave like a householder, but a householder cannot (yet) be like a monk. However, the very distinction between 'possessions' and 'possessiveness' does open up at least a theoretical possibilty of non-attachment to possessions, an attitude or intention, having a significant part to play in liberation from karma. And as we shall see, although the interdependence of the two of possessiveness and the householder's life continues to hold good from the ascetics' perspective, for the laity a gap begins to open up. Parigraha thus becomes an all-inclusive term for the inner, emotional reaction to the external world - a reaction
101 Gombrich 1988, pp. 44-45.
Jain Education International
-
For Private & Personal Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org
| SR No. | 001196 |
| Book Title | Harmless Soul |
| 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 |