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Non-Violence
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does not demand calling up of an assembly of monks to decide the nature of transgressions as it is with the Buddhists, nor is the prosecution of the guilty according to the Jainas in such an elaborate affair as it is in the Buddhist jurisprudence.
However, some of the offences committed by the monks and nuns are more or less alike both in the Buddhist and in the Jaina texts. For instance some offences against celibacy and the showing of disrespect to Buddha or Tirthamkara etc. are very much alike in both the systems.Another prominent similarity is that both the systems emphasize non-violence as the primary virtue and incontinence or an offence relating to sex as the greatest vice, as the emphasis laid on this offence in the scriptures of both the systems would reveal.
The violation of the precepts are made known to the Buddhist Samgha through the recitation of the Pātimokkha code on fortnightly Uposatha days. It is here only that the confession of the offences takes place, and the Samgha gets the knowledge of the intensity of the offence committed by the monk and inflicts the penalties accordingly. It is said that the Samgha in cases of offences can inflict the prescribed penalty of ‘parivāsa' or 'mannatta' or any other punishment as the case may be, even against the will of the guilty Bhikkhu.
Each of the Pātimokkha codes is divided into eight charters. Out of these eight, seven pertain to the transgression of all the rules about daily life of the monk (which include the five precepts we are mainly concerned). The last, called 'Adhikaranasamatha', does not directly relate to the transgression of any of the rules. Offences have been dealt with in the descending order of their seriouness in the chapters of the two codes, that is the first chapter deals 1. येसं भिक्खु अतर वा अञतरं वा आपज्जित्वा यावतीहं जानं परिच्छादेति तावतीहं तेन भिक्खुना अकामा परिवत्थब्बं ।
- Pārājika, vol. I, p. 277.
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