Jaina Perspective in Philosophy and Religion

SR No.: 001747
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Ramjee Singh
Publisher: Parshwanath Shodhpith Varanasi
Publication Year: 1993
Total Pages: 282
Language: English
Classification: Book_English, Epistemology, Metaphysics, Ethics, & Yoga
File Size: 15 MB

Page 131

122
Jaina Perspective in Philosophy and Religioti
set-up is different for everybody. The Jainas also believe that the effects of karma are different upon different individuals in accordance with the nature (praksti ), duration (sthiti ), intensity of fruition ( anubhāga ) and quantity (pradeśa ) of karmas. It is true that in the list of enumeration of various types and sub-types of karmas, we do not find a satisfactory explanation as to why any of this is this and not otherwise, But the Jaina thinkers try to uphold the relevance of karmatheory to the minutest details of life. For instance, the namakarma is said to be of forty-two kinds with sub-classes of ninety-three kinds; as they bring about their respective effects. This demonstrates the anxiety of the Jainas to ascribe anything and everything to some or other form of Karma. In other words, this is to assert the doctrine of universal causation known as Karmaváda.
(3) I think, this may be interpreted as a sort of Idealism, known as Kārmic Idealism, which will be distinct and different from both Subjective and Objective Idealisms. A rough comparison, however, may be made with Kantian Idealism, where there is a construction of categories. But here the categories are not created by the understanding. They are only related to the understanding. That way, even the NyayaVaišeşikas have said that generality and particularity are relative to our understanding. In fact, samānya and visesa are pure objective categories but they only point out that there is some sort of relativity, but this relativity is objective and not subjective. Hence, we can conclude that Kārmic Idealism is not a form of subjective Idealism. Nor is it Objective Idealism, since the Jainas do believe in the eternal co-existence of matter and mind as independent principles of reality. The union of soul and matter is regarded as self-proved and hence the eternal bondage of soul and kärmnic matter is described as its very nature, as dirt in golden ore. This is the startiog point of Jainism.
(4) However, in the ordinary sense of the term, we cannot speak of karmic idealism because karma, in the Jaina pbilo.