Bhagavana Mahavira and his Relevance in Modern Times

Author(s): Narendra Bhanavat, Prem Suman Jain, V P Bhatt
Publisher: Akhil Bharat Varshiya Sadhumargi Jain Sangh

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Mahavira and His Relevance
superfluities and super-abundances. In expounding its implications, ethical writers emphasised that one should not feel too much attachment towards his own material possessions and should resist all temptations. One may keep wealth and commodities to satisfy one's requirements but should not lose oneself in the pursuit of material gain. At the same time, one should rise above prejudices, jealousies, greed, vanity, fear, hatred and susceptibility etc.
If this Anuvrata were followed, it would prevent that ruthless and lustful competition for wealth and empire which is the bane of the present age and is responsible for its gravest ills. The attitude of mind which it inculcates is perhaps more necessary today than ever before. It is the negation of sordid, all absorbing materialism. Science has multiplied production and scattered superfluities here and there. Modern industry and commerce have fostered growth of large towns where life is lived not only in great hurry but also on an artificial plane. Men are caught up in a vast network of impersonal forces which seem to defy understanding. They succumb to psychological maladies, nervous break-down, partial or complete, which is one of the most tragic phenomena of the present age. The battle of life, that is the higher life, has become very difficult and can be fought only with that attitude of stoicism which the fifth Aņuvrata stresses. From slightly different point of view, this Aṇuvrata may be described as the right sense of proportion, a perception of the true scale of values.
Ethical Wholeness :
It will be apparent from a review of the Anuvratas that they are interdependent and supplementary. The application of one to human relationships leads logically to that of others and in fact would stultify itself without the others. Only there is primacy belonging to the first of them, that is, non-violence. It is the foundation of all higher life. In the Jain as well as Buddhist code, it is wider than humanitirianism, for it embraces the whole of sentient creation. Its comprehensiveness, logically complete, is a further illustration of the ethical life being a function of mental attitude and outlook. Like non-violence, honesty (Asteya) and stoicism (Aparigraha) are negative only in appearance and really positive in their application. Together the five Anuvratas constitute a single conception of life, ethical and spiritual, a consistent loyalty to the great principle of selftranscendance, a transvaluation of values.