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* Based on bodily features
The beings having gross (audārika), protean (vaikriya), conveyance (āhāraka), fiery (taijasa) and kārmic (kārmana) bodies.
* Based on sex i) The infernals and living beings born by agglutination are necessarily hermaphrodites, ii) The gods are either females or males. iii) Living beings in human and animal species could be male, female or hermaphrodite.
* Based on the places of birth (yoni)
There are 84 lakhs varieties of places, where life could exist i.e. where a living being could take birth. These birth-places could broadly be categorized into nine types - i) Occupied by living things only ii) Cold iii) Covered iv) Occupied by non-living things only
v) Hot
vi) Uncovered
vii) Occupied by living and non-living things viii) Both hot and cold in part ix) Both covered and uncovered in part
* Based on the types of birth i) Viviparous and oviparous animals and vertebrates without placenta are born in the womb. ii) Infernal beings and gods are born by descent. iii) All other beings are born by agglutination.1
Just like a kaleidoscope visualizes the images of glasses in different views merely by changing the angle, likewise Jaina philosophy also classifies living species into various types. The kaleidoscopic visualization of different livings presented in species, really inspires a scholar of Jainaology for further search.
Rationale for the choice of the subject
Special interest arose while reading the description of the birth and birth-places of living species mentioned in Jaina texts. I thought of correlating the similarity between 'birth by agglutination' and 'agglutinated organisms' with modern Zoological and Botanical studies. It was noticed that the reproduction of plants and animals mentioned in today's scientific study by asexual reproduction, cloning, tissue culture etc. were almost similar to the process of reproduction of various types of agglutinated micro-organisms explained in Jaina texts.
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