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14
JAINISM
In Rajputana, however, they remained, and so highly were they respected that Akbar, the magnanimous Muslim emperor, issued an edict that no animals should be killed in the neighbourhood of Jaina temples.
The Jainas are divided, we may add, into two great sects — the Digambaras, known in the fourth century B.C., and mentioned in one of Asoka's edicts; and the Shvetambaras, apparently more modern. The latter are now by far the more numerous, but it is said that the Digambaras possess far vaster libraries of ancient literature than does the rival sect.
Leaving that historical side, let us now turn to their philosophic teaching. They assert two fundamental existences, the root, the origin, of all that is, of Samsära; these are uncreated, eternal. One is Jiva or Atmā, pure consciousness, knowledge, the Knower, and when the Jiva has transcended Avidyā, ignorance, then he realizes himself as the pure knowledge that he is by nature, and is manifested as the Knower of all that is. On the other hand Dravya, substance, that which is knowable; the Knower and the Knowable opposed one to the other, Jiva and Dravya.
