$JES 401 Jain Philosophy and Practice 2 Level 4 Book

Author(s): JAINA Education Committee
Publisher: JAINA Education Committee

Page 99

There is no escape from the evil consequences of our evil acts. Contemplation of such grim reality of helplessness is Asharan Bhävanä. The awareness of the fact of helplessness is the initial aim of this reflection; he who has this awareness becomes heedful and seeks only the Ultimate Release.
03. Samsär Bhävanä (Cycle of Birth and Death)
In the cycle of birth and rebirth, mother of one life may become wife in another life, and similarly wife can become mother or anyone else. How strange and futile is the Samsär (world)? We should not have any attachment to it. This Bhävanä asks us to remember that this self is wandering in this Samsär from one life to another since time infinite. This endless wandering from one life to the other must have some purpose. Can there be an end to it? Surely, it cannot be the scheme of Nature that this Ätmä (soul) should go on endlessly to experience pleasures and pains, hopes and despairs life after life without any purpose. If there is any purpose, I must find it out. No one has gained anything by repeating this endless cycle of birth and rebirth, life and death and all the difficulties, tensions and turmoil of aimlessly moving in this Samsär. What can I do to avoid it? A mind of a Sädhaka (aspirant) constantly occupied with this type of perception finally leads him to a state of Nirgrantha (without knot or Granthi) where every knot of bondage is dissolved. This reflection keeps one on the path of righteousness. One should reflect on this fact so that one may not deviate from the path of duty and good actions and may not be a victim of trifling temptations of the world.
On the fact that this world is full of miseries and there is no end to natural calamities; how so many efforts we may put in, it is utterly impossible to remove all of them completely. When such is the situation, is it proper to increase miseries by nurturing mutual indifference through mutual injustice and selfishness? It is necessary to bear in mind that we create our own innumerable miseries and add to the already existing ones by our own defects. By developing good humanitarian qualities and fostering universal friendliness, we should try to decrease the miseries in the world as far as possible.
Such contemplation on the fact that this world is full of miseries and there is no end to natural calamities is Samsär Bhävanä.
04. Ekatva Bhävanä (Solitariness)
"I am alone, I was born alone, I will die alone, I am sick alone, I have to suffer alone, I alone have to experience the consequences of Karma which I have earned," Therefore, one should be cautious, and stay away from attachment and aversion.
Ekatva means aloneness and Anyatva means separateness. We enter the world alone and we leave it alone. Each one of us has to suffer the fruits of our individual karma. Our cooperation in worldly affairs, love and affection for others should not be allowed to be degenerated into attachment because no amount of attachment for our either family or friends can save us from the pangs of life. Consciousness that I am alone and I alone have to chart my course of life is not being selfish. Also that my family, my friends and my belongings are not mine, does not breed selfishness, but clinging to all these things does bring selfishness because such clinging is the result of gross attachment which is the worst vice in human
nature.
In fact, both these Bhävanäs of Ekatva and Anyatva (otherness) are not only complimentary to each other but are also the logical consequence of the Asharan Bhävanä referred to above. What these two Bhävanäs prescribe is to suggest that you have to bear the fruits of your own karma - others cannot help relieve you of them. Similarly, you cannot help relieving others of the fruits of their karma. If we cultivate such an objectivity of outlook, we will be better equipped to serve others around us and ourselves.
05. Anyatva Bhāvanā (Otherness)
Out of an onrush of delusion, we commit the mistake of regarding our own rise and fall, as the rise and fall of our body and everything else belonging to us. The separateness of soul from body is to be reflected over on the basis of their qualities as follows: "This body is inanimate, ephemeral while my soul; (possessed of no beginning and no end), is conscious and eternal." On account of this type of reflection Anyatva Bhävanä, human being is not agitated and perturbed by bodily pains and pleasures. Generally, all energy is used up in thinking about bodily pains and pleasures. If one knows as to who one is, in the light of that pure knowledge, one will not develop attachment for the body, nor will one become a slave of
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