Ahimsa the Ultimate Winner

Author(s): N P Jain
Publisher: Prakrit Bharti Academy

Page 49

The Air is polluted The forests are dying The creatures are disappearing”
In the lofty Jain tradition, let us ask for forgiveness. But that is not enough. Let us mobilize the strength to change ourselves and come in communion with Nature. Only then would we the humans, deserve the joy of celebrating our scientific, technological, literary and artistic achievements. Global Jain community must mobilize the will and initiative to contribute meaningfully to international environmental co-operation.
The challenge is enormous, especially for those who wish to practice and propagate Jainism for universal welfare in the new millennium. Already almost 90% of the world's rain forest have been annihilated. Every five years we cause 1,00,000 plant and animal life forms to become extinct through deforestation. The havoc we have created environmentally through violent and exploitative behavior in the last 40 years will take, according to the scientists, 10 million years to undo. Hence, the urgent need to make an earnest beginning by forging first an emotional bond between us and nature.
A DYNAMIC, SCIENTIFIC AND POSITIVE PHILOSOPHY
In practicing and propagating Jain principles in the new Millennium, we need to create the wide awareness that Jain religion is neither a one God nor a one-book religion with set rituals, dogmas and doctrines. 24 Tirthankaras have first practiced it, and preached it over a spread of five centuries in differing historical and social circumstances giving Jain religion a firmly anchored but at the same time a dynamic and ever refining character. It has at no time been dogma-ridden, caste-bound or encumbered by blind beliefs in mercies, miracles and superstitious practices. Jain religion is logical and scientific and
Ahimsa: The Ultimate Winner
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