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Samayascra
191 FACT of the universe, that the living and the non-living substances quite exhaust the universe, and make up a perfect division of it hy dichotomny, and that the living is the living and never anyihing else, and the non-living is itself and never living.
This lesson was taught in the great, soul-purifying gâthâs of Sumayasåra by Sri Kunda Kunda Acharya in the first century B.C.
Samayasára is full of the one idea of one concentrated divine unity. It is as persistent and emphatic aboui the Soul's identity with Itself, being the only living Conscious Reality, as pure Mahomedanism is about the Vohdániyata of God, or Monistic Vedântisin about Para-Brahma. This is the only One Idea wich counts. All Truth, Goodness, Beauty, Reality, Morality, Freedom is in this. The Self and It alone is true, good, lovely, real, moral. The non-Self is error, myth, mithyålva, ugly, deluding, detractor from and obscurer of reality, immoral, worthy of shunning and renunciation, as bondage and as anti-liberation. This Almighty, all-Comprehensive, claim of SELF-ABSORPTION must be perfectly and completely grasped for any measure of success in understanding Sri Kunda Kunda Acharya's works, indeed for the true understanding of Jainism.
Few are the works, if any, extant of Jainism as digested of old by the Apostles and Omniscients after Lord Mahavira; and with the doubtful exception of Svami Kârtikeya's Arupreksa, none is older than Sri Kunda Kunda's. The tradition is much older. It is unbroken, continous. Indeed it is claimed to be eternal. But in its written form, no work is older than the soul-analysing, soul-clarifying, soul-illuminating stanzas of Sri Kunda Kunda. They sparkle with one life and shed one white lustre, namely, the divine, limitless nature of Soul when absorbed in Itsclf. Sva-Samaya or self-absorption is the key-note, the purpose, the lesson, the object, the goal and the centre of Sri Kunda Kunda's all works and teachings. The Purc, All-Conscious, Self-absorbed Soul is God and never less or more. Any
ection, causal or effectual, with the non-self is a dclusion, limitation, imperfection. bondage, To obtain liberation or deification, this connection must be destroyed. Thus and then the "bound" soul, who is bandáh, becomes the Liberated Soul, ichá Khuda, "Self come to Sell,
w i j Zál-e-paka, "Pure Entity". The man becomes Man. The Son of man returns to His Father in Heaven. Man becomes HIMSELF. Man becomes GOD.
To guard against any misunderstanding of Jainism, this central tcaching, this clear golden goal must ever be kept in inind and in view.
may well and legitimately be asked: what is the practical use of this Jaina idea of self-absorption ?
The answer is: The mere insight into and kacwledge of this Rcal Reality, is of cvcryday use in the conduct of our individual and collective lives. It is a true and the only panacea for all our ills. Its rigour may be hard. Its preliminary demand may occasion a wrench from our cherished habits, customs, and fashions of thought and action. But its result which is imine
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