Studies in Jaina Philosophy

SR No.: 001616
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Nathmal Tatia
Publisher: Jain Cultural Research Society
Publication Year: 1951
Total Pages: 366
Language: English
Classification: Book_English, Philosophy, Knowledge, Yoga, & Epistemology
File Size: 9 MB

Page 287

JAINA DOCTRINE OF KARMAN
[CH.
the same plane as well as the passing away (cuti) from the same after the due period. The consciousness of different planes has different lifeterms. The higher the plane of life, the longer is the life-term.
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With this background in mind let us study the Buddhist way of classification of karman. The Buddhist substitute for a permanent soul is an everchanging consciousness which, as we have seen, is an integration of a number of psychic factors. The consciousness quâ willing is determined by various psychic factors, moral and immoral. The passive consciousness, that is, consciousness quâ knowing and feeling is the resultant of past actions, good and bad. It is non-moral. The nature of the resultant consciousness at the time of death determines the plane of life it enters in the next birth. This conception compares favourably with the Yoga conception of all the accumulated traces of past actions working together and determining the nature of the next life. The Buddhists classify these past actions (karman) in four ways based on four different principles. Thus these are the types of karman according to the functions they perform: (1) karman which conditions birth after death (janaka), (2) karman which sustains (upatthambhaka) other karman but does not itself cause rebirth, (3) karman which thwarts (upapilaka) and thus weakens other karman, and (4) karman which overpowers (upaghataka) the other weak karman and produces its own effect. The following are the types of karman according to the priority of the fruition (pakadānapariyāyena): (I) karman which is very serious (guruka) such as the killing of one's own mother, (2) karman which is done just before death (asanna), (3) karman which is repeatedly done (acinna), and (4) karman which is of a light kind (kaṭattākamma). Of these types, the succeeding type fructifies only in the absence of the preceding one. The reason is quite obvious. The strength of the karman determines the priority of its fruition. The following classification is according to the time of fruition (1) karman which gives its effects in this very life (diṭṭhadhammavedaniya), (2) karman which gives its effect in the next life (upapajjavedaniya), (3) karman which gives its effect in some life after this (aparapariyavedaniya), and (4) karman which is ineffective (ahosikamma). The following are again the types of karman according to the plane of life of their fruition: (1) immoral (akusala) karman which produces its effect in the plane of misery (apaya-bhūmi), (2) moral (kusala) karman which produces its effect in the better plane of the world of desires (kāmāvacara-bhūmi), (3) moral karman which produces its effect in the plane of the form (rūpāvacara-bhūmi), and (4) moral karman which produces its effect in the plane of the formless (arūpāvacara-bhūmi). In these ways of classification, again, we find much affinity with the Yoga conception. The Buddhist conception of the