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 306

v. 1]
DOCTRINE OF GUŅASTHANA
269
and a tirthankara is this that the latter can reveal and preach the truth and found a religious community while the former cannot. The worldly career of a soul destined to be a tirthankara is purer and much more spiritually elevated than that of an ordinary soul destined to be emancipated. The tīrthankara is a spiritual leader and an inspirer and a founder or reviver of a religion which is destined to last for an appreciable period of time. The worldly existence is beginningless and there has been an infinite number of cycles of creation, and it is held that the first founder of culture and civilization of each cycle is the first tirthankara of that cycle. It is only the tīrthankara who can reveal the truth and inspire the masses. This is the Jaina conception of Godhead.
After this brief digression to the idea of Godhead in Jainism, let us revert to our original problem of the first awakening of the predilection for truth (samyagdarśana). There is always a tendency in the soul to run away from the circle of world existence. But this centrifugal tendency is thwarted by a centripetal force that keeps the soul tracing the circumference of the world process. The centripetal force consists in the passions of attraction (rāga) and repulsion (dueșa) or rather their root viz. perverted attitude (mithyātva) towards truth. The centrifugal tendency is that part of the characteristic potency of the soul which still remains unhindered or unobstructed. This remain-1 ing part of the potency we have referred to in the last chapter. It is this centrifugal tendency that ultimately leads the soul to the right path. The problem 'Why should this tendency develop into a patent force in one soul, and remain only a dormant virtue in another' is not regarded as needing solution. It is a fact of common experience that different individuals have different degrees of power manifest in them. And this is an ultimate fact of experience incapable of being accounted for by further ultimate facts. The soul, during the course of its eternal wanderings in various forms of existence, sometimes is possessed of an indistinct vision of its goal and feels an impulse from within to realize it. This impulse is the work of the eternal centrifugal tendency already mentioned. The impulse is a kind of manifestation of energy, technically known as yathapraurtta karana. It is not always effective, and
1 Vide supra, p. 241.
2 How the soul happens to develop this tendency is illustrated in a number of ways on the analogy of the experience of common facts. For these illustrations see ViBh, 1204-1217.
3 Sometimes the eternal tendency itself is stated as the yathäpravsttakarana. Cf. anādikālāt karmaksa paņapravịtto 'dhyavasāyaviseşo yathāpravịttakaranam ityarthaḥ-Byhadurtti, Vibh, 1202. But generally and almost unanimously the yathāpravsttakarana is identified with the temporary impulse lasting for less than a muhurta (forty-eight minutes) wherein the soul achieves such purification as causes it to feel uneasiness with the worldly existence. This yathāpravrttakarana
• www.jainelibrary.org