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16
FUNDAMENTALS OF JAINISM
unentertainable hypothesis. It follows from this that all the souls now involved in bondage--and their number is infinite--have always been in an impure and imperfect state. There is nothing surprising in this conclusion, for just as gold is found in a mine in an impure condition without any one having ever deposited the pure metal there, so are souls to be taken as having existed in a condition of impurity from all eternity.
The only possible counter-hypothesis of the renewal of bondage by the order of an extra-supreme God is met by the argument that there can be no possible ground for distinction between one pure spirit and another. Since the qualities of substances do not vary to suit individual whims, all pure spirits must possess the same attributes. Hence, there can be no such thing as a God of Gods. On the other hand, if it be said that the supposed extrasupreme being is a pure spirit plus some thing else, that would make his being a compounded organism which experience and observation prove to be liable to disintegration and decay. Furthermore, a perfect God must be presumed to be above longings of every kind, and cannot, therefore, be credited with the unholy desire of imposing fetters of pain and misery on his brethren.
Lastly, when we look into the nature of this extra-supreme deity of modern theology we only discover him to be a personufication of karmic energy and power. It has been made clear in 'the Key of Knowledge that the gods and goddesses of the several systems of theology which are flourishing in our midst today are only the personifications* of certain mental abstractions and forces of a psychic or occult type. If the reader has read that book, he would not find it difficult to understand that the following passages disclose the attributes of the karmic force, the regulator of the destinies of all kind of beings involved in the samsára, rather than the qualities of a perfectly blissful being such as a Siddhatman (perfect Soul) must necessarily be :
(1) "I create...evil." Isaiah, XLV. 7.
(2) "Wherefore I gave them statutes that were not good, and judgments whereby they should not live."-Ezekiel, XX. 25.
(3) "It repented the Lord that he had made man on earth and it grieved him at his heart."--Genesis, VI 6.
The Permanent History of Bharata Varsha'. by K.
See also Narayana lyer.