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matters have come to such a pass that the true explanation is un-ceremoniously condemned as an atheistic heresy! Nevertheless, no one actually tries to give a proper definition of him whom they all talk about. If they had ever attempted to do so, they would not have failed to discover that the attributes they ascribe to their god can only go to contradict him out of existence. For instance, the qualities of omniscience and bliss, which are the necessary attributes of divinity, are in no sense compatible with the facts embodied in such statements as the following from the Holy Bible:
"And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart."-Genesis, VI. 6.
A god who makes things and beings only to repent of having done so afterwards has no right to be called omniscient and blissful. Desirelessness must be a feature of divinity, in whatever form it may be posited, but that it is not one of the characteristics of the god postulated by most of the modern theologies is only too apparent to need proof. The true God is the Ideal of Perfection, the status of the Siddhâtman, which is already within each and every soul; and it is this ideal, manifested, in the most perfect degree, in the lives of the four and twenty Perfect Ones, the Tirthamkaras of Jainism, and known as the twenty-four Spiritual Elders in Christianity, which the Jainas go to receive their daily inspiration from in their Temples. Let us not forget that it is the devotion to the Ideal, not a fanatical doting on a false and non-existent idol, which can ever be the means of
THE SIDDHANTA.
spiritual progress. Even in worldly matters, he who wishes to excel in a profession must take some great,
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