What is Jainism

SR No.: 006714
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Champat Rai Jain
Publisher: Champat Rai Jain
Total Pages: 210
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 11 MB

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ESSAYS AND ADDRESSES exist outside us in the world, but it is no less true that none of them constitutes happiness, which is purely and simply a state of our own consciousness. That this is so, will become evident to any one who will but take the trouble to ascertain the source of the feeling of happiness or joy which we feel when we pass successfully through some trying ordeal, e.g., a university examination. The question is: whence arises the feeling of exhilaration which is experienced on the receipt of the telegraphic message assuring us of our success? Does it arise from the peculiar size or colour of the paper on which the message is scribbled ? No, for most obviously neither the paper, nor its size, nor even its colour is capable of producing a similar effect on another being. Neither would the very same paper be productive of joy in our own case should the message: it conveyed be a disappointing one. Perhaps happiness is contained in the language or the words of the message ? But even this proves: to be a false surmise, for unless one believed the statement of fact conveyed to be true, one would not experience the feeling characteristic of joy. What, then, is joy, and whence does it arise ?
Analysis reveals the important fact that joy is nothing other than an inalienable attribute of the soul itself, so that it only arises from within our own being. Reflection also discloses the fact that: happiness arises only with the cessation of some irksome obligation, task, duty or burden, and then only for so long as another task or burden is not imposed on the soul. The lawyer who feels joy on being called to the bar begins to experience a very different kind of feeling as soon as he desires to reap the practical benefits of his success.
It may be pointed out that there are three kinds of pleasures, or joy, and two of pain, namely, physical pleasure, mental pleasure and spiritual pleasure, and mental and physical kinds of pain. There is no such thing as spiritual pain. Spiritual pleasure is the true happiness which arises only when the soul is left free to itself. It then feels its own life-pulsations that stand for pure joy. Physical pleasure results from the contact between the senses and external things; and mental pleasure from mental pictures called up by the imagination. Mental pain, likewise, arises from dwelling, in imagi