$JES 904 Compendium of Jainism (Jain Academic Bowl Manual 3rd Edition)

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

Page 23

INTRODUCTION
A02 Dharma: Religion
the situations are ephemeral. The happiness that we might be experiencing from such situations can disappear at any time. We do not know what is going to happen at the next moment. In fact, our socalled happiness is unstable and short-lived.
Even if situations conducive to our interest were likely to continue indefinitely, peace and happiness may not always materialize. As the poet Percy Shelley put it in one of his poems, we are prone to 'look before and after and pine for what is naught.' Hardly anyone feels satisfied with what he has. We have the tendency to desire what we don't have. Our desires are endless and as long as those desires remain unsatisfied, no one can ever feel happy and experience real peace that can lead to blissful pleasure. We may strive hard for achieving that pleasure but hardly any one attains it any time during his life.
02 What is Religion?
The growth of scientific knowledge and technology has given new dimensions to our lives and has influenced every aspect of our living. Science has done a great service to mankind by providing amenities for pleasant living and has saved men from many miseries and uncertainties of the primitive past. It has also destroyed many superstitions and religious dogmas. At the same time, the scientific outlook has uprooted the moral, religious, and cultural values of our society. In the light of the advance of scientific perspective some individuals have renounced our traditional religious beliefs and values. We know much about the atom but not much about the values needed for a meaningful and peaceful life. We are living in a state of disarray. Our lives are full of worries, emotional disorders, and conflict of values. Today man needs mental peace and complete integration with his own personality and with his social environment. Can religion, in general, and Jainism, in particular, meet this need of our times? Yes, it can. Religion has eternal concepts and values that can meet the needs of the time.
Now, what do we mean by the term religion? Many western scholars define religion as faith. Some say that religion is belief in spiritual beings. Others define religion as faith in the conservation of values. The inner core of religion is faith, but it is the faith in our own existence and our own real nature, belief in some eternal and spiritual values that are essential for the existence and uplift of mankind. A generally accepted definition of religion is 'Dhärayati Iti Dharma'. It means that what holds (from falling) is religion. Our remaining in a deluded state constitutes a fall and religion tends to protect us. It teaches us that the physical body, with which we identify ourselves, is alive on account of the soul that abides within it. The soul is our true self. We are the consciousness pervading the body and our association with a body terminates at the end of life. The true nature of consciousness is to know whatever happens without any sense of craving or aversion. It is therefore futile to be pleased or displeased with different situations. Thus by revealing our true nature, religion helps in extricating us from the deluded state in which we have been entangled since time without beginning. Religion teaches us to know ourselves.
"He, who knows one (soul), also knows all; He who knows all, knows the one."
This quotation taken from Jain scripture Ächäränga Sutra states that he who knows the soul, knows everything else. This is so because the knowledge of true Self as pure, enlightened, not aging, immortal and ever blissful soul can lead to the state of having no desire.
Therefore, Jain scriptures define religion as 'Vatthu Sahävo Dhammo'. It means that religion is the real nature of things. Religion is the nature or property of all substances (Dravyas) including soul and matter. We seldom try to explore who we are and what is our true nature. Nothing against our nature is going to give us lasting happiness or real satisfaction. Without knowing ourselves and without realizing our own nature, we have been trying to gain happiness. No wonder that it eludes us, because we have been trying to gain it from extraneous circumstances. In a way, we have been dwelling all the time in a state of delusion about ourselves. We can just as well say we have been pursuing a mirage.
That being so, what is the real nature of the human being? The real nature of human beings is equanimity. Ächäränga sutra defines religion as mental equanimity. In Bhagavati sutra, Gautam Swami asks Bhagawan Mahavir, "What is the nature of soul?" Bhagawän replies, "The nature of soul is equanimity." Gautam asks, "What is the ultimate aim of soul?" Mahävir replies, "The ultimate aim of the soul is also equanimity." Ächärya Kund-kund, in Samaysär, has equated the essential nature (Svabhäv) of soul with equanimity.
Compendium of Jainism - 2015
Page 23 of 398