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position was a different one with regard to the newly proclaimed system of Buddha,
I have not yet touched on the relation between Jain philo sophy on the one hand, and Sankhya-Yoga on the other. We may expect a greater community of ideas between these systems since both originated in the same class of religious men viz the ascetics known as Śramanas or to use the more modern term Yogins. As rezarks the practice of asceticism, the methods and the aims of Yoga, it has long been proved that the Yoga of Brāhmaṇas, Jainas and Bauddhas, are closely related to each other and there can be no doubt they have all developed from the same source. But I am now concerned only with those philosophical ideas which have a connection with ascetic practice and form tha justification there of.
Now, the Sankhya view as to the problem of Being is clearly a kind of compromise between the theory of the Upanisads and what we may call the common-sense view. The Sankhyas adopt the former with regard to the souls or purusas which are permanent and without change. They adopt the latter when assigning to matter or prakriti its character of unceasing change The Sankhyas contend that all things besides the souls or purusas are products of the one Prakriti or primieval matter and similarly the Jainas teach that practically all things besides the souls or jivas are made up of Matter pudgala which is of only one kind and is able to develop into every thing. It will thus be seen that the Sankhyas and Jainas are at one with regard to the nature of matter; in their opinion matter is something which may become anything.
This opinion, it may be remarked, seems to be the most primitive one, not only was it entertained by the ancients but aloo it underlies the universal belief of transformation occurring in the natural course of things or produced by sorcery and spells. This is a point I wish to make, that the Sankhyas and Jainas started from the same conception of matter but worked it out on different lines. The Sankhyas teach that the products of
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| SR No. | 008001 |
| Book Title | Shraman Bhagvana Mahavira Part 1 |
| Original Sutra Author | N/A |
| Author | Ratnaprabhvijay, D P Thaker |
| Publisher | Parimal Publication |
| Publication Year | 1989 |
| Total Pages | 650 |
| Language | English, Sanskrit |
| Classification | Book_English, Biography, History, & Religion |
| File Size | 15 MB |