Outlines of Jainism

SR No.: 007012
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: S Gopalan
Publisher: Wiley Eastern Private Limited New Delhi
Publication Year: 1973
Total Pages: 216
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 9 MB

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JAINISM
of consciousness not from the human level alone but from the very stage of 'its coming into existence'. In this emphasis on taking an integral view of consciousness we see that far from laying less emphasis on human responsibility there is a consistent exhortation for man to live really a life worthy of his stage of evolution, first to see that he maintains the level without slipping down and then to aim at the higher evolution of his consciousness.
In the Uttarādhyayana-Sūtra we have an interesting illustration of this essential principle of integral consciousness that we find in Jainism. The illustration is this : Three merchants, each having his own capital started business in a place other than their own. One of them recorded considerable gain, the second man returned home with the capital without either gain or loss and the third returned home
ter losing his capital. In the illustration the capital stands for human life, the gain stands for attainment of heavenly bliss and the loss stands for retrogression into the animal state or suffering the hellish unhappiness. The person who comes back home without loss or gain stands for one who is born a human being in his next birth also. “Those who through the exercise of various virtues become pious house-holders, will be born again as men, for all beings will reap the fruits of their actions. But he who increases his capital is like one who practises eminent virtues. The virtuous, excellent man cheerfully attains the state of gods ... He who practises evil acts and does not fulfill his duty will be born in hell ...A wise man is he who weighs in his mind the state of the sinner and that of the virtuous. Quitting the state of the sinner, the wise realizes that of the virtuous" 10.
It is evident then that the Jaina philosophers' view of metempsychosis not merely emphasizes the eternality of the human soul and hence also the possibility of progress and retrogression but also points to the continuity of consciousness and above all the responsible nature of the human situation. In this sense the theory of metempsychosis provides the foundation for Jaina ethics. This will become evident when we consider certain aspects of Jaina ethics in a later chapter.
9 VII. 14-15 10 Ibid., VII. 20-21 ; 28; 30